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TWO THOUSAND 

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 

ABOUT THE WAR 




Committee on Public Information 

DISTINGUISHED SERVICE CROSS OF THE UNITED STATES 



MEDAI^S OF THE ALLIES 




^^«t 











1. UNITED STATES— 

Medal of Honor, Army 

2. UNITED STATES— 

Medal of Honor, Navy 

3. UNITED STATES— 

Certificate of Merit Medal 

4. GREAT BRITAIN— 

Distinguished Service Order 



5. GREAT BRITAIN— 

Victoria Cross 

6. FRANCE— 

Croix de Guerre (Cross of War) 

7. FRANCE— 

Medaille Militaire (Military Medal) 

8. BELGIUM— 

Order of Leopold 



9. ITALY— Medal of Military Valor 



Two Thousand 

Questions and 
Answers 

<iAbout the 

War 



A Catechism of the Methods of Fighting, 
Travelling and Living; of the Armies, Navies 
and Air Fleets; of the Personalities, Politics 
and Geography of the Warring Countries. 
With seventeen new War Maps and a 
Pronouncing Dictionary of Names. 

Compiled on two conti- 
nents under the direction 
of the editorial staff of the 
Review of Reviews. 




THE REVIEW OF REVIEWS CO. 

NEW YORK 
1-9-1-8 



^ 






Copyright, 1918, by 
THE REVIEW OF REVIEWS COMPANY 



©GU5J 1296 

JAN 10 1919 



PREFATORY NOTE 

Second and Revised Edition 

THE questions and answers in the pages of this volume have 
come from suggestions offered by many different people. The 
nucleus of paragraphs around which the first edition was 
built came from Henry Stead's "War Fact Book," which was pub- 
lished in book form in the spring of 191 8 in Australia — the accumu- 
lation of nearly one hundred chapters of the "Catechism of the 
War" which has been a semi-monthly feature of Stead's Review 
during the war. 

The editor chiefly responsible for the work of compiling and 
classification of both the first and the present edition of "2000 Ques- 
tions and Answers" is Mr. Julius W. Muller of New York. This 
second edition has been revised under the editorial supervision of a 
university professor of history obtained through the suggestion, 
made at our request, of the authorities at Washington. 

Mr. Muller has been a well-known newspaper man in the 
metropolis for more than 27 years, and has filled editorial positions 
on two New York dailies over a considerable period of years. 

As an author he is chiefly known for his patriotic work "The 
Invasion of America," published first in syndicate form by a number 
of the most prominent newspapers in America and later issued in 
book form by E. P. Dutton & Co. This work of fiction, picturing 
the invasion of America via New England as an accomplished fact, 
was one of the first and most vigorous stimulants to the military 
preparedness of the American nation. The newspaper publication 
was aggressively used by the most active of the American societies 
organized to awaken the nation to the need for preparedness in war. 

In the same year, 19 15, Mr. Muller published "The A. B. C. 
of National Defense," a popular treatise showing what the nation 
should do to put itself in a position to defend its 30,000 miles of 
coast against a first-class power. 

This revised edition of "2000 Questions and Answers About 
the War" has, at the request of the publishers, been carefully read 
by the Intelligence Office of our Department of War, they have 
given it their full approval. We are also indebted to experts 
familiar with the official point of view of our Allies, especially 
England and France, for their careful reading of the proofs to 
ensure the utmost accuracy in the presentation of facts. 

The Publishers. 



CONTENTS 

America's Principles for World Settlement 

American Fighters m France 

Troop Transport Overseas 

Man Under Water (The Submarine) 

Man in the Air .... 

Our Navy ..... 

Weapons of War .... 

Our Army ..... 

Identification of Fighting Men . 

The Prisoner of War .... 

Casualties of War 

Battles of the Great War 

Sea Fights of the Great War 

Strategy of the War — Military and Political 

Foreign Navies .... 

Soldiers of the Allies 

Ravaged Belgium .... 

Lithuanians and Poles 

Clamoring Nationalities . 

Restless Russia .... 

Japan and Manchuria 

Cost of War (America) 

Cost of War (Allies) 

Cost of War (Central Powers) 

Germany (Industrial Structure) 

Germany (Political Structure) 

Germany (Food) .... 

The Selective Draft .... 

Our First Year of War (April 6. 1917-April 6, 191 

Populations and Religions 

Ship Destruction .... 

American Ship Seizures 

The World's Ships of Peace 

European Trade Arteries 

Prince Lichnowsky's Revelations 

Europe's Food ..... 

America's Food .... 

The World's Raw Materials 

American Conduct of War 

Some Past Campaigns 



Page 
1 
42 
54 
57 
67 
78 

87 
103 

114 
116 
121 
128 

I3 1 

136 

141 
147 
153 
159 
163 
175 
184 
190 
197 
202 
206 
214 
227 
231 
241 
246 
252 
256 
261 
266 
269 
272 
279 
283 
289 
295 



CONTENTS — continued 



The Red Cross and Others 

Who's Who in Royalty 

War's Who's Who in Fighters . 

War's Who's Who in Civilians 

The Workers 

Spies, Traitors and Alien Enemies 

Belgium's Long Torment 

Record of Events in the Great War 

Armistice, Text of . 

The Pronunciation of War Names 

Index . 



Illustrations 

Distinguished Service Cross of the United States and 
Medals of the Allies .... 

Army and Navy Insignia .... 

Flag Signalling ...... 

Flags of the Allies (in color) 



Page 
297 
300 

3°5 
310 

319 
322 

3 2 S 
34i 
35 2 
357 
369 



Frontispiece 
Page 109 
Page 113 

Plate XVIII 



Maps (in color) 

The World at War Plate I 

The German Barred Zones .... Plate II 

The German Alliance ..... Plate III 

The Western Battle Front ..... Plate IV 

Lowlands of Northern France and Belgium . Plate V 

(With Battle Lines) 

Highlands of Northern France (With Battle Lines) Plate VI 
Eastern France and Alsace-Lorraine (With Battle Lines) Plate VII 

Austro-Italian Frontier (With Battle Lines) . Plate VIII 

Balkan States (With Battle Line) . . . Plate IX 

Asia Minor (With Battle Line) . . . Plate X 

Western Russia, Poland and Russo-German Frontier Plate XI 

Russia in Europe and Caucasia . . . Plate XII 

(Showing Extent of German Invasion) 

The Pan-German Plan Plate XIII 

Physical Map of Europe . .... Plate XIV 

Racial Map of Europe Plate XV 

Nationalities in Southern Europe . . . Plate XVI 

U. S. Army Cantonments .. . . . Plate XVII 




•q^Volettd 

T CHEEK TERm TOS „ 



Longitude 3f 



The "Barred Zones" which Ge 



kl*Apl m 1 




Ipted to Erect around her Enemies. 




The figures for the Ottoman Empire are conjectural . 

expense certainly unlikely to favor the non-Germans at the Germans' 

livenln ufe o e ,h^. ^££?££*£?J? a \ he J"***" of B ">^ »" Bulgaria 

up the remain. ,'■• , IP, ^"" ,,lnt '' 11 '',"' »>y the Turks and (j reeks who make 

than a million hut sei • , ',' r,' ','!;'" '"'I'" 1 "*'""- Together they amount to more 

' l SL l'<»att iigmes tor each are not available. 



The German Alliance: Note the many <3 



SUPJmCT NATIONALITIES 

OF THE 

OBRMAN AUUANGB 





'Nationality 


State 


Number 


fcSE 




Germany 


59,769 000 


920 


H GERMANS 


Austria 


9.950.000 


35 


^M 


Hungary 


2.057000 


98 


s 




Tola) 


71,756000 


61 8 


MAGYARS 


Hungary 


10.051,000 


48 1 


1 BULGARS 


Bulgaria 


3,204.000 


73.8 


H TURKS 


„ 


? 


? 


B 

mm 


» 


OttomanEmpire 


7,000,000 


35,0 




Total 


92,011,000 


65 5 


Idanes 


Germany 


162,000 


25 


^Ialsatians 


„ 


1,629,000 


25 


(^^■f-rfnch 


„ 


258,000 


4 


i: (LITHUANIANS 


„ 


122,000 


2 


| | SORABlANS 


„ 


157,000 


0.24 




POLES 


„ 


3,834,000 


59 




" 


Austria 


4.968,000 


175 




Total 


8 8 Jt'.Oun 


94 




RUTHENES 


Austria 


3,519.000 


12 4 






•> 


Hungary 


473,000 


2-3 




Tola' 


3.992,000 


7. a 




CZECHS - 


Austria 


6,4 36,000 


227 




SLOVAKS 


Hungary 


1,968,000 


94 




Total 


H.404,000 


164- 



I Nationality 



C K 






3 pv£ 



JUGOSLAVS 



Austria 
Hungary 



^1 ITALIANS 
■ GREEKS 

GJ3 ARMENIANS 

(. I NESTOR I ANS 

I I ARABS 



Total Subjec, 

L...IQ J •* >• ■_ _. ■' 



Austria 

Hungary 

Bosnia 



' Total 



Austria 
Turkey 
Bulgaria 
Turkey 



2,036,000 
2,940,000 
l.89B.0dC 



275,000 
2,949,000 
3,224,0( 



768.000 
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2,000,000 
2,000,000 



7.2 
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GERMAN ADVANCE 1918- 



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THE PAN-GERMAN PLAN 

as realised by War 
IN EUROPE AND IN ASIA 

"Central Europe" and its Annexe in the Near East 

(Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, Turkey) 
The Entente Powers 
Territory occupied by Central Powers 
Territory occupied by Entente Powers 
GERMANY'S MAIN ROUTE TO THE EAST 

(Berlin-Bagdad, Berlin-Hodeida, Berlin-Cairo-Cape') 
Supplementary Routes 

(Berlin- Trieste, Berlin-Salonica-Athens, Berlin-Constantza-Constantinople) 
Uncompleted sectors 





The "Coc 




urope. 



UNITED STATES 



«^ V ^ , / '' 



y < T a n a 

' l' 



°**G- -/ 



O.v W 



/-B 



N. D A K O T 



'Da/ B /B w 




>■ 



S. D A K O T 



N E B R A S K 

C E N 1 



%o<S*" A " 



i V T A H 



COLORADO 



H. 



CANTONMENTS FOR THE 
NATIONAL AKMY 

^Ayer, Mass 
ghtstow 
I Atlanta. Ga. 
I American Lake, Iff ash. 
I Columbia, S. C. 
I Chillicothe, Ohio 
) Little Rock. Ark. 
► Ljuisville, Ky. 
) Battle Creek, Mich. 
I San Antonio, Tex. 
I I'd. Riley, Mans. 
Des Moines, la. 
Yaphank, N. Y. 
1 Annapohi June. Md. 
Petersburg. Va- 
Roekford. Ml. 

MEDICAL OFFICERS' 
TRAINING CAMPS 



1 



Allentown, Pa. 

Ft. Ben. Harrison, Ind, 

Ft. Des Moines, la. 

Ft. Oglethorpe. Ga. 

Ft. Riiey, Cans. 



j (XIV) * 

K A 



AE '20J, A / 

J N. M e X I 



C O 



s 



U T H\ E r N D 



, OS 

L ' 

(XV) 

part: 



TEX 



NATIONAL GUARD 
TENT CAMPS 

a Ft. Worth. Tex. 
b Waco, Tex. 
u Houston. Tex. 
d Ft. Sill, Okla. 
o Deming, N. M. 
i San Diego, Cal- 
g Greenville, S. C. 
h Spartanburg, S. C. 
i Augusta, Ga. 
j Macon, Ga. 
k Mineola, N. Y. 
1 Montgomery, Ala, 
m Anniston, Ala. 
n Charlotte, N. C. 
o liattiesburg, diss. 
p Alexandria, La. 



OFFICERS' TRAINING CAMP3 

I Plattsburg Barracks, N Y. 

II Madison Barracks. N. Y. 

III Ft. Niagara, N. Y. 
Fi Myer, Va. 
Ft Oglethorpe, Ga. 
Ft. McPherson, Ga. 
Ft. Benjamin Harrison, Ind 
Ft. Sheridan, 111. 
Ft. Logan H. Roots, Ark. 
Ft Snclling, Minn. 
Ft Riley, Kans. 
Leon Springs, Tex. 
Presidio of Sau Francisco, Cal. 



IV 

V 

VI 

Vli 

VIII 

IX 

XI 
XII 
XU1 



Where the United ! 



MAP 



LEGEXD 

Departmental Headquarters p 1 
Coast Artillery Headquarters p 3 

State Boundary 

Army Department 
Cantonment Division 




11 Field, Wichita Falls. Tex. 

lington Field Houston, Tex. 

Uj Field, San Antonio, Tex. 

vc Field, Dallas, Tex. 

ch Field, Waco. Tex. 

m;- Taliaferro, Ft. Worth, T< 

andl;r Fiold, Essington, Pa. 



,ner Field, Lake Charles, La. 
Hazelhurst Field, Miuecla, N. Y. 
Park Field, Memphis, Tenn. 
Post Field, Ft. Sill, Okla 
Rockwell Field, Sao Diego, Cal 
Selfridge Field, Mt Clemens, Mi. 
Scott Field, Belleville, 111. 



SPECIAL ARMY SCHOOLS 
Aviation Training Camps: 
A Mincola, N. Y. 
B Mt. Clemens, Mich. 

Garfield, Ohio 

Rantoul, 111. 

East St. Louis, 111. 

Ashburn, 111. 

San Diego, Cal. 
II San Antonio, Tex. 
I Bellville, 111. 

Schools of Military Aeronautics: 
J Massachusetts Institute of 

Technology 
K Cornell University 
L Ohio State University 

University of Illinois 

University of Tex 

University of California 

Georgia School of Technology 

Princeton University 

Reserve Engineers' Training Camps: 

R Belvoir, Va. 

S American University, D. C. 

T Ft. Leavenworth, Kaos. 

U Vancouver Tarracks, Wash, 



ny is in the Making. 



C.S.HAMMOND 4 CO..N.Y. 



FLAGS OF THE ALLIES 



UNITED STATES 




BRIT. EMPIRE 



NATIONAL 

DOM. CANADA 




BELGIUM 




MERCHANT 

SERBIA 




MERCHANT 

CUBA 




NATIONAL 

CHINA 




NATIONAL 




ROYAL STANDARD 

^ AUSTR ALIA 







f7; 



FEDERAL FLAG 

JAPAN 




IMPERIAL STANDARD 

RUSSIA 




ENSIGN 

PORTUGAL 




MERCHANT 

MONTENEGRO 




NATIONAL 



FRANCE 




NATIONAL 



c^NEW ZEALAND 




ITALY 




MERCHANT 



MERCHANT 



ROUMANIA 




MERCHANT 



BRAZIL 




MERCHANT 



AMERICA'S PRINCIPLES FOR WORLD 
SETTLEMENT 



Q. — Is the world war really in- 
comparably vaster than any 
preceding one? 

A. — The money cost alone would show 
that it is. A Federal Reserve Bank esti- 
mate just before the end of the fourth 
year of war was that the world's daily war 
expenditure (figuring in both sides) 
closely approached 175 millions of dollars. 
During these four years, the increase in 
public debts of the twelve principal bel- 
ligerents had been 1167 billions — 77.3 bil- 
lions for the nine principal countries in the 
Allied group and 39.4 billions for Ger- 
many and Austria-Hungary. All the pre- 
vious wars of all the world since the 
American Revolution (which includes 
such truly colossal wars as the Napoleonic 
wars, the Crimean War, the American 
Civil War, the Franco-Prussian and the 
Russo-Japanese Wars) cost altogether 
about 16 billions. Of these the Napol- 
eonic Wars, lasting with intermis- 
sions through 22 years, cost about 6J4 
billions. 

Q. — Have expenses of this war in- 
creased or decreased? 

A. — They have increased enormously. 
See pages 190 to 205 in this volume where 
war-costs up to the early part of 1918 are 
closely analyzed and compared with world 
wealth and world resources. The total 
daily cost of the war up to March 1, 1918, 
was estimated as $116,700,000 as against 
the estimate made in July, 1918, that the 
cost then was $175,000,000. 

Q. — Are more nations involved in 
this war than in any previous 
one? 

A. — The wars between England and 
France at various times involved prac- 
tically all the Powers and States of 
Europe, and the actual armed conflict ex- 
tended to Canada on the American con- 
tinent and to India in Asia. But this war 
has involved in addition the States of 
Central and South America and such 
countries as China, Japan and Siam. which 
never figured in a European continental 
war before. 



Q.— Is this truly, then, named "The 
World War"? 

A. — It is so named with absolute accu- 
racy. At the end of the fourth year 
(August, 1918) practically 95 per cent of 
the world's population was in the war. 
The countries still classed as neutral com- 
bined had only 130 million population, and 
a quarter of these were natives of the 
Dutch East India possessions, whereas 
the countries actually at war had a com- 
bined population, including colonials, of 
more than 1,700 millions. The propor- 
tion of the earth's surface left nominally 
at peace, and the relation of proportions 
between the two opposing sides, are strik- 
ingly shown in the map in this volume : 
"The World at War." 

Q.— How do the opposing forces 
compare in power? 

A. — The Entente Allies and the United 
States had 94.4 per cent of the area of the 
warring nations ; 76.3 per cent of the pop- 
ulation (even omitting the tremendous 
Asiatic population included in the British 
Empire) ; 78.5 per cent of the men of 
military age available for service — exclud- 
ing Africans and Asiatics ; 66 per cent of 
the men actually enrolled in the armies 
and navies ; 80.5 per cent of the national 
wealth; 83.1 per cent of the national in- 
come — considered as the yearly earnings 
of the peoples. 

The combined debt of the Allies in 
March, 1918, was 14.7 per cent of their 
wealth, that of the Central Powers 28.7 
per cent of their wealth. The annual in- 
terest charge of the latter was 11.8 per 
cent of their national income against 4.6 
per cent in the case of the Entente Allies. 

The surplus food-producing regions of 
the world were practically all controlled 
by the Entente, either directly or through 
command of the seas. The same thing 
was largely true of the metals and coal. 

Q. — Exactly what was the align- 
ment in August, 1918, at the 
beginning of the fifth war 
year? 

A. — On the side of the Central Powers 



] 



Questions and Answers 



was, therefore, stripped of so much ter- 
ritory that she should never regain the 
overwhelming influence she once had. 
The principle was gradually extended. 

The theory of the balance of power 
became the keystone of European poli- 
tics, and its maintenance has been con- 
sidered so important in the minds of the 
statesmen of Europe that few scruples 
have been allowed to stand in the way 
when it was threatened. 

At first the "balance of power" was 
upheld by the combination of all nations 
against any one that grew too large. 
They made occasional treaties to act 
jointly, but always the established prece- 
dent was that if at any time the status 
quo was destroyed, the treaties were void. 
Thus, if any state, however small, should 
shift its boundaries, any other state 
would hold itself free to abrogate exist- 
ing treaties, and form new treaties to es- 
tablish a new balance of power. 
Q. — Is Pan-Americanism like Pan- 
Germanism or Pan-Slavism? 

A. — No. The Pan-Nationalistic move- 
ments of Europe all looked more or less 
toward obtaining for certain races or na- 
tionalities a hegemony over the rest — a 
political ascendency and often a complete 
rule. Pan-Americanism, to the contrary, 
does not mean the ascendency in any 
manner of any particular American na- 
tion or race, or of any group of Ameri- 
can nations. President Wilson expressed 
the ideals of the United States when he 
said, in his third annual Message (De- 
cember 7, 1915), "We will aid and be- 
friend Mexico, but we will not coerce 
her; and our course with regard to her 
ought to be sufficient proof to all America 
that we seek no political suzerainty or 
selfish control. The moral is, that the 
States of America are not hostile rivals, 
but co-operating friends, and that their 
growing sense of community of interest, 
alike in matters political and in matters 
economic, is likely to give them a new 
significance in international affairs and in 
the political history of the world. This is 
Pan-Americanism. It has none of the 
spirit of empire in it. It is the embodi- 
ment, the effectual embodiment, of the 
spirit of law and independence and lib- 
erty and mutual service." 

the "Balance of Q- — * s tne United States on record 

as favoring a League of Na- 
tions? 

A. — It is on record as favoring a league 
of nations to preserve peace and guaran- 
tee justice. The principle was announced 
as early as May 27, 1916, before a meet- 
ing in Washington of the League to En- 



it was : Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, Ger- 
many, Turkey. 

On the side of the Entente Allies : Bel- 
gium, Brazil, China, Costa Rica, Cuba, 
France, Great Britain, Greece, Guate- 
mala, Haiti, Honduras, Italy, Japan, 
Liberia, Montenegro, Nicaragua, Panama, 
Portugal, San Marino, Serbia, Siam, 
United States of America. 

The following had severed diplomatic 
relations, though not declaring war up to 
that date: Bolivia, Egypt, Peru, Uru- 
guay. 

Q. — Had any nations withdrawn 
from the war at the end of the 
fourth year? 

A. — Russia withdrew from the war in 
March, 1918; Roumania withdrew in May, 
1918; Bulgaria in September, 1918. 

Q. — What nations are actually in- 
cluded under the term 
"Allies"? 

A. — On September 5, 1914, Great Brit- 
ain, France and Russia as the big nations 
and Serbia and Montenegro as the small 
nations united in the war against the 
Central Powers signed the famous Pact 
of London in which all pledged them- 
selves not to make a separate peace. 
Japan signed later, and Italy signed when 
she entered the war. As the term was 
used later, it meant the nations that were 
combined in war against the Central Pow- 
ers, but the actual signatories of the Pact 
were only those mentioned here. 

Q. — Is the United States one of the 
Allies? 

A. — No. The United States freely of- 
fered and gave its aid to the full extent 
of its resources, and willingly placed 
its Expeditionary Forces under the su- 
preme command of the French Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the Allied forces. 
But it was not allied with the signatories 
of the Pact of London. The War Cyclo- 
pedia (U. S. Committee on Public Infor- 
mation) says : "The United States has 
made no alliance with any of its asso- 
ciates and is not bound by any agree- 
ments, nor has it any aim but to 'make 
the world safe for democracy.'" 

Q.— What is 
Power"? 

A. — It is a principle whose effective 
observance began after the fall of Na- 
poleon, when the nations opposed to him 
deemed that future peace might be as- 
sured by preventing any one nation from 
again becoming over-powerful. France 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



force Peace, in the form of a speech by 
President Wilson. He said that the 
United States is willing to become a part- 
ner in any feasible association of nations 
formed in order to realize these objects: 
(i) that every people has a right to choose 
the sovereignty under which they shall 
live ; (2) that the small states of the world 
have a right to enjoy the same respect for 
their sovereignty and for their territorial 
integrity that great nations insist on ; 
(3) that the world has a right to be free 
from every disturbance of its peace that 
has its origin in aggression and disregard 
of the rights of people and nations. 

Q. — When did war begin between 
the United States and Ger- 
many? 

A. — It began formally shortly after 
noon, April 6, 1917, when President Wil- 
son signed the joint resolution passed by 
both houses of Congress declaring: 
"That the state of war between the 
United States and the Imperial German 
Government which has been thrust upon 
the United States is hereby formally de- 
clared." This, however, was only the 
formal beginning. Actually, the world 
realized that war existed from the date of 
the President's appearance before the 
Special Session of Congress (the evening 
of April 2) in which he delivered his mes- 
sage asking Congress to declare the recent 
submarine measures of the German Gov- 
ernment to be in effect nothing less than 
war against the Government and people of 
the United States. The State Depart- 
ment had immediately sent this news in 
the form of a circular telegram to all the 
American foreign missions. 

Q. — How long before this had 
diplomatic relations been sev- 
ered? 

A. — On February 3, 1917, the President 
addressed Congress reviewing the sub- 
marine issue and announcing that he had 
directed the Secretary of State to an- 
nounce to the German Ambassador that 
all # diplomatic relations between the 
United States and Germany were severed, 
that the American Ambassador at Berlin 
would be withdrawn immediately, and that 
the American Secretary of State had been 
instructed to give the German Ambassa- 
dor at Washington his passports. Ger- 
many had been warned after the Sussex 
case that a continuance of her methods 
of submarine warfare would have this 
result. 



Q. — What was the first official 
measure after we entered war? 

A. — It was a presidential proclamation 
(dated April 6, 1917) that a state of war 
existed. 

Q. — What did this proclamation 
order? 

A. — Beyond the formal announcement 
of a state of war, the proclamation con- 
cerned itself almost wholly with the 
status of alien enemies — that is, male sub- 
jects of Germany then within our borders. 

Q. — Was internment of enemy 
aliens ordered? 

A. — No. They were enjoined to refrain 
from violating the laws, to refrain "from 
actual hostility or giving information, aid 
or comfort to the enemies of the United 
States" and to comply with all regula- 
tions made or to be made by the Presi- 
dent. In return they were assured of re- 
maining undisturbed in the peaceful pur- 
suit of their lives and occupations except 
so far as restrictions might be necessary 
for their own protection or the safety of 
the United States. 

Q. — What were the chief restric- 
tions on enemy aliens? 

A. — The President's proclamation of 
April 6, 1917, promulgated regulations 
providing that alien enemies must not 
possess any implement of war, explosives, 
aircraft, signalling device or wireless, 
anything in cipher, anything in invisible 
writing, or any form of cipher code. They 
were prohibited from being within one- 
half mile of any government or state 
camp, fort, arsenal, aircraft station, gov- 
ernment vessel, navy yard or any factory 
for making any product for the army or 
navy. It was provided also that they 
should not write or publish any attack on 
the government, on Congress, or on the 
measures and policies adopted by the gov- 
ernment or against any person in the 
service of states or Federal Government. 
There was a clause providing that enemy 
aliens must not reside without a permit in 
any localities that might be designated 
from time to time as prohibited areas. 

Q. — Did the proclamation state the 
punishment for violation? 

A. — Yes. There was one provision that 
an alien enemy suspected on reasonable 



Questions and Answers 



grounds of violating or preparing to vio- 
late the regulations, must remove to any 
location designated by the President and 
stay there until he received a permit to 
leave. The final clause in the proclama- 
tion added that an alien enemy who vio- 
lated or attempted to violate any presi- 
dential regulation, or any criminal law of 
the United States, or who might be be- 
lieved on reasonable grounds to be aiding 
or about to aid the enemy, should be 
subject to summary arrest by the United 
States marshal and to confinement in such 
penitentiary, prison jail, military camp, 
or other place as the President might 
designate. 



act cover 



Q. — Does the espionage act < 
only cases of actual spies 

A. — No. The act (approved by Con- 
gress June 15, 1917) is one of the most 
sweeping measures ever placed on the 
statute books of the United States. It 
does not limit itself to the matter of spy- 
ing or conveying information to the ene- 
my. It gives the President of the United 
States absolute control over the movement 
of all vessels in our waters, with the right 
to take possession of them, foreign or 
domestic. It also gives the President 
power to prohibit exportations of any 
given article at any time or to any coun- 
try. The use of search warrants is greatly 
extended by this law ; and by restrictions 
on the use of the mails the President is 
enabled to forbid the mails to those whom 
he (or his officers of government) may 
hold to be misusing them. 

Q. — Did our first declaration of 
war include Germany's Allies? 

A. — No. The declaration of a state of 
war was against Germany alone. For- 
mally and officially, we still remained at 
peace with Germany's allies, Austria- 
Hungary, Bulgaria and Turkey. 

Q. — What was the vote in Con- 
gress on war with Germany? 

A. — The Senate adopted the war resolu- 
tion on April 4 by a vote of 82 to 6. At 
3 a. m. April 6 the House of Representa- 
tives adopted the resolution by a vote of 
373 to 50. 

Q. — How did Congress vote on war 
with Austria-Hungary? 

A. — The joint resolution was adopted by 



both Houses with only one vote (Social- 
ist) in opposition. 

Q.— At what date did we enter 
formally into war with Aus- 
tria-Hungary? 

A. — On December 4, 1917, in his Fifth 
Annual Message to Congress, the Presi- 
dent recommended that Congress declare 
the United States to be in a state of war 
with Austria-Hungary. The Senate and 
the House adopted a joint resolution to 
that effect on December 7. 

Q. — Did we sever diplomatic rela- 
tions with Turkey when we 
entered war? 

A. — No. Turkey severed diplomatic re- 
lations with us. The American Legation 
at Berne, Switzerland, informed the Sec- 
retary of State on April 20, 1917, that as 
the United States had declared itself to 
be in a state of war with Germany, the 
Ottoman Government's ally, it was neces- 
sary for the Ottoman government to rup- 
ture diplomatic relations with the United 
States. American interests were confided 
to the Swedish Minister. 

Q. — Did diplomatic relations con- 
tinue with Bulgaria? 

A. — Up to September 27, 1918, when 
Bulgaria asked the Allies for an armis- 
tice, our diplomatic relations with Bul- 
garia had not been severed. 

Q. — What American Governments 
declared war on Germany after 
we did? 

A. — The West Indian Republic of Cuba 
and the Central American Republic of 
Panama declared war on April 7, 1917. 
Brazil severed diplomatic relations on 
April 11 and declared war October 26, 
1917. Bolivia severed diplomatic relations 
without declaring war April 13. Guate- 
mala followed suit April 28 and declared 
war April 23, 1918. Haiti did so June 
18, 1917, and declared war in July, 1918. 
Peru severed relations October 6, 1917, 
Uruguay October 7, and Ecuador Decem- 
ber 8, 1917. Nicaragua declared war May 
7, 1918. Costa Rica declared war May 
24, 1918. Honduras declared war July 19, 
1918. 

Q. — Was the Czar still in power 
when we entered war? 

A — No. A revolution which began on 
March 11, 1917 in Petrograd dethroned 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



the Czar, overthrew not only the Govern- 
ment but the entire governmental system 
and proclaimed a Republic under a provi- 
sional government. 

Q. — What was our first belligerent 
act after declaring the state of 
war? 

A. — We seized or requisitioned more 
than ioo German merchant vessels which 
remained at shelter in our ports after the 
beginning of war in 1914. They aggre- 
gated 686,000 tons. 

Q. — Did we send troops to France 
before the draft bill was in 
force? 

A. — No. The Selective Draft Act was 
signed on May 18, 1917, and immediately 
proclaimed. In this proclamation the 
President said : "It is not an army that 
we must shape and train for war; it is a 
nation." 

Q. — Does the selective draft law 
reach out beyond our terri- 
tory? 

A. — It reaches out beyond our geo- 
graphical territory, viewing the United 
States as being territorially continental. 
It takes in Alaska, Hawaii and Porto 
Rico, these three localities occupying the 
status of Territories — that is, parts of the 
Union which have not yet reached the 
sovereign dignity of States, but whose 
people _ are a part of the United States 
and subject to laws governing the United 
States. 

Q. — Did a great military operation 
signalize our entry into war? 

A. — Yes. It was not any military activ- 
ity by us, but it followed the United 
States declaration of war closely. On 
April 9, 1917, the British launched a great 
offensive against the German lines near 
Arras. The battles lasted until May 3, 
and the British gained from 3 to 5 miles 
along the front there, carrying the famous 
Vimy Ridge. On April 16, 1917, the 
French began an attack along the Aisne, 
advancing on a front of about 25 miles 
between Soissons and Rheims, and cap- 
turing Craonne Ridge. 

Q. — What was the first belligerent 
activity of the United States? 

A. — On May 4, 1918, the American navy 
entered into the war actively by means 
of a destroyer flotilla dispatched from 



this country and co-operating with the 
British fleet in the war-zone. 

Q. — When did our first convoy of 
troops go to France? 

A. — In the early morning of June 14, 
1917, the transports of the first convoy 
sailed from New York with about 15,000 
soldiers of the Regular Army, mostly 
infantrymen, with some ambulance and 
hospital men, motor truck drivers, signal 
corps experts, etc. The formation of this 
first expeditionary force was : 4 regiments 
of infantry, 1 signal corps company, 4 
motor truck companies, 1 bakery company, 
ambulance company No. 6, field hospital 
No. 6 and about 500 stevedores. There 
also was a regiment of marines who had 
been assembled at Philadelphia. 

Q. — Was General Pershing's staff 
the first body of American sol- 
diers to reach Europe? 

A. — The first of the fighting contingents, 
but not the first of the American army 
organizations. The first men to cross the 
ocean after the United States entered war 
were members of the Medical Officers' Re- 
serve Corps. Members of the Medical En- 
listed Reserve Corps had crossed with 
units for service in British hospitals, and 
when General Pershing arrived, many 
were already serving in France. Base 
Hospital No. 4 celebrated the anniversary 
of its arrival on French soil on May 25, 
1918. 

Q. — Did General Pershing accom- 
pany the first troops? 

A. — No. He preceded them. General 
Pershing with a staff of 24 field officers, 
30 line officers, 56 clerks, 4 interpreters 
and 67 enlisted men (182 men in all) left 
Governors Island at noon of May 28, 
1917, and boarded the White Star steam- 
ship Baltic, which was anchored in the 
Lower Bay. The party landed in Liver- 
pool June 8, proceeded to London, left 
there June 13, and reached France the 
same day, one day before the first troop 
convoy sailed from New York. They 
reached Paris June 14. 

Q. — Was our first troop convoy 
very large? 

A. — The first fleet of troop transports 
that went to France (sailing June 14, 
1917) consisted of 18 transports. They 
were mostly American passenger ships 
from the coasting or West Indian trade, 
such as the Havana, Saratoga, Tenadores, 



Questions and Answers 



Pastores, Antilles, Momus, Lenape, Mal- 
lory, Finland and San Jacinto. The reg- 
ular army transports Hancock, Hender- 
son and De Kalb brought marines from 
Philadelphia to the rendezvous outside of 
New York harbor. The old transport 
McClellan served as refrigerator ship, 
and the Montanan, Dakotan, Occidente 
and Luckenbach brought up the rear with 
freight and animals. 

Q. — When did the first American 
soldiers land in France? 

A. — The fleet of 18 transports was met 
oifjune 22, 1917, by a flotilla of American 
destroyers which had preceded them for 
duty in the war-zone. On June 26 the 
Tenadores, Saratoga, Havana and Pas- 
tores docked at the French seaport which 
had been selected as the first of the Amer- 
ican base ports. During the succeeding 
days the other transports came in and by 
July 2 the last of them was safely at a 
pier. On July 4, 1917, the first American 
troops ever seen in Paris (a battalion of 
infantry) marched through that city to 
parade at the laying of a wreath on La- 
fayette's tomb. 

Q. — What was America's first dip- 
lomatic activity in the world 
war? 

A. — It was an identical note sent out on 
August 6, 1914, 1 p. m., instructing the 
American Ambassadors at London, Berlin, 
Vienna, St. Petersburgh (not then called 
Petrograd), Paris and Brussels to inquire 
whether the governments to which they 
were accredited were willing to agree that 
the laws for naval warfare as laid down in 
1909 by the Declaration of London should 
be applicable to the war then under way. 
The United States expressed its belief 
that an acceptance of these laws would 
prevent grave misunderstandings which 
otherwise might arise as to the relations 
between neutrals and belligerents. 

Q. — What was the Declaration of 
London? 

A. — The Declaration of London laid 
down rules for the maritime phases of 
war. These rules were decided advances 
over previous practices and went far to 
safeguard the rights of neutrals. They 
covered the conduct of naval war, block- 
ade, and the treatment of neutral ship- 
ping, and they defined and listed contra- 
band. The Declaration was agreed to on 
February 26, 1909 by most of the great 
nations. The United States, Great 
Britain, Germany, Austria-Hungary, 



France, Russia, Italy, Japan, Holland and 
Spain were represented. It had not been 
ratified by all the governments, however, 
although it had been assumed that all 
would consider themselves bound by it in 
time of war. 

Q. — Did the belligerents decline to 
observe the Declaration of 
London? 

A. — No. But they differed in their atti- 
tude toward its provisions. The salient 
features of the replies were as follows : 
From Ambassador Penfield, Vienna, Au- 
gust 13, 1914: "Austro-Hungarian Gov- 
ernment have instructed their forces to 
observe stipulations of Declaration of Lon- 
don as applied to naval as well as land 
warfare during present conflict conditional 
on like observance by enemy." From Mr. 
Gerard, Berlin, August 22, 1914 : "German 
Government will apply the Declaration of 
London provided its provisions are not dis- 
regarded by other belligerents." (How the 
German Government actually did conduct 
sea warfare the world knows only too well.) 
Ambassador Page, London, August 27, 
1914, forwarded notes and memorandums 
from the British foreign office, the salient 
passage in which was: "His Majesty's 
Government who attach great importance 
to the views in your Excellency's note and 
are animated by a keen desire to consult 
as far as possible the interests of neutral 
countries, have pleasure in stating that 
they have decided to adopt generally the 
rules of the declaration in question, sub- 
ject to certain modifications and additions 
which they judge indispensable to the 
efficient conduct of their naval operations." 
The Russian government, on August 27, 
accepted the Declaration of London "with 
exact modifications adopted by England 
and France." Ambassador Herrick, Paris, 
September 3, 1914, informed Washington : 
"The French Government will observe the 
provisions of the Declaration of London 
with following reservations." The reser- 
vations, like the British, concerned nature 
and definitions of contraband, the status 
of neutral ships carrying contraband, etc. 

Q. — Did the United States continue 
its efforts? 

A. — In notes dated October 22, 1914, to 
Ambassador Page, London, and October 
24 to Ambassador Gerard, Berlin, the 
United States, referring to the modifica- 
tions, said that the American Government 
"feels obliged to withdraw its suggestion 
that the Declaration of London be adopted 
as a temporary code of warfare during 
the present war; that therefore this Gov- 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



eminent (United States) will insist that 
the rights and duties of the United States 
and its citizens be defined by the existing 
rules of international law and the treaties 
of the United States without regard to the 
provisions of the Declaration of London ; 
and that this Government reserves to itself 
the right to enter a protest or demand in 
each case in which those rights and duties 
so denned are violated or their free exer- 
cise interfered with." 



Q. — What was the first German 
war-zone decree? 

A. — It was a proclamation issued at Ber- 
lin February 4, 1915, saying: "(1) The 
waters surrounding Great Britain and Ire- 
land, including the whole British Channel, 
are hereby declared to be war zone. On 
and after the 18th of February, 1915, 
every enemy merchant ship found in the 
said war zone will be destroyed without 
its being always possible to avert the 
dangers threatening the crews and pas- 
sengers on that account. (2) Even neu- 
tral ships are exposed to danger in the 
war zone as in view of the misuse of 
neutral flags ordered on January 31 by 
the British Government and of the acci- 
dents of naval war, it can not be always 
avoided to strike even neutral ships in 
attacks that are directed at enemy ships." 
In an accompanying memorandum the 
German Government claimed as justifica- 
tion that the British Government had 
from the beginning violated the laws of 
nations, especially the Declarations of 
London and Paris, and that in addition 
it had declared the whole North Sea be- 
tween Scotland and Norway to be com- 
prised within the seat of war. 

Q. — Did the United States protest 
against the war-zone decree? 

A— On February 10, 1915, the Depart- 
ment of State sent a note to the German 
Government through Ambassador Gerard, 
calling attention to the serious possibili- 
ties inherent in this course of action, and 
added : "It is, of course, not necessary to 
remind .the German Government that the 
sole right of a belligerent in dealing with 
neutral vessels on the high seas is limited 
to visit and search, unless a blockade is 
proclaimed and effectively maintained, 
which this government does not under- 
stand to be proposed in -this case. To de- 
clare or exercise a right to attack and 
destroy any vessel entering a prescribed 
area of the high seas without first cer- 



tainly determining its belligerent nation- 
ality and the contraband nature of its 
cargo would be an act so unprecedented in 
naval warfare that this government is •re- 
luctant to believe that the Imperial Gov- 
ernment of Germany in this case contem- 
plates it as possible." It was this note 
which stated that "the Government of the 
United States would be constrained to 
hold the Imperial German Government to 
a strict accountability . . . and to take 
any steps it might be necessary to take 
to safeguard American lives and property 
and to secure to American citizens the 
full enjoyment of their acknowledged 
right on the high seas." 

Q. — Is there international warrant 
for declaring specified sea- 
areas as war-zones? 

A. — Our government held that there 
was no settled principle of international 
law to justify the practice. Its attitude 
was defined as follows : "As the question 
of appropriating certain portions of the 
high seas, to the exclusion of the use of 
the hostile area as a common highway of 
commerce, has not become a settled prin- 
ciple of international law assented to by 
the family of nations, it will be recognized 
that the Government of the United States 
must, and hereby does, reserve generally 
all its rights in the premises, including 
the right not only to question the validity 
of these measures, but to present demands 
and claims in relation- to any American 
interests which may be unlawfully af- 
fected, directly or indirectly, by virtue of 
the enforcement of these measures." 
Note Department of State, Fehruary 19, 
1917, to the British Ambassador. 

Q. — What would have been the ef- 
fect of recognizing the war- 
zone decree? 

A. — The Committee on Public Informa- 
tion in "Our War for Self-Defense," 
(War Information Series No. 5) says: 

"Our ships might indeed have stayed 
away from the ocean area over which 
the German Government .thus asserted 
exclusive sovereignty. Their crews and 
passengers might have remained at home 
in obedience to the kaiser's command. 
In obedience to that command our Gov- 
ernment might have -ordered them -to do 
so. But none of this would 'have been 
any safer to our independence, any more 
in the interest of peace between this 
•country and Germany, or any more rea- 
sonable on any count, than if the Kaiser 



8 



Questions and Answers 



had ordered us to stay off all the ocean 
outside our own territorial waters, and 
we had obeyed. 

"If the United States ought, in con- 
science or from policies of peace, to have 
yielded to the Kaiser's extension of his 
invasive battle line out upon the ocean 
to the twentieth meridian in our direc- 
tion, we should have had no reason in 
conscience or peace policy for forcibly re- 
sisting its extension at the Kaiser's com- 
mand to the thirtieth degree, nor to the 
sixtieth, nor even to the very 3-mile limit 
off our own coast line. There is no argu- 
ment in opposition to our war against the 
German Kaiser as a war of self-defense 
which would not be as reasonable if, in 
his lust of world conquest, he were im- 
mediately approaching our water frontiers 
across the ocean, as almost three years 
ago, obsessed with that lust, he approached 
the land frontiers of France across Bel- 
gium." 

Q. — Were efforts made by America 
to establish a compromise on 
sea warfare? 

A. — Yes. Ten days after the war-zone 
decree (on February 20, 1915), the Amer- 
ican Government sent an identical note 
to Great Britain and Germany, proposing 
reciprocal concessions. The belligerents 
were to agree mutually: (1) not to sow 
floating mines ; (2) not to plant anchored 
mines except within cannon range of har- 
bors for defensive purposes only; (3) all 
mines to bear the stamp of the govern- 
ment owning them and to be so construct- 
ed as to become harmless if separated 
from their moorings ; (4) submarines not 
to attack merchant vessels except to en- 
force the right of visit and search ; (5) 
neutral flags not to be used. The most 
important part of the American sugges- 
tion, however, was one proposing a com- 
promise on food shipments. The bellig- 
erents were not willing to accept the terms 
and the matter was dropped. 

Q. — Who was the first American 
killed by submarine warfare? 

A. — Leon C. Thresher, who was on the 
British steamship Falaba, which was tor- 
pedoed March 25, 1915, with a loss alto- 
gether of more than 100. The Falaba had 
at first attempted flight, after being or- 
dered to heave to, but she had come to a 
stop when the torpedo was launched. The 
German Government claimed that the ship 
had delayed lowering her lifeboats while 



she signalled for assistance. The United 
States claimed in answer that only forcible 
resistance or continued efforts to escape 
could be held to serve as legitimate cause 
for endangering civilian lives on a mer- 
chant ship. 

Q. — Did the "Falaba" case occur 
before the "Lusitania" sink- 
ing? 

A. — It occurred a little over five weeks 
before the Lusitania sinking. For that 
reason it dropped measurably from public 
sight in the sense that the discussion over 
it became merged with the greater and 
more serious public and diplomatic dis- 
cussion of the Lusitania case. 

Q. — What American ships suffered 
in the war-zone? 

A. — The first American ships to suffer 
in European waters after the war-zone 
decree were the steamships Evelyn (Feb- 
ruary 22), Carib (February 22), Green- 
brier (April 2). These early cases caused 
some excitement in America until inves- 
tigation disclosed that the vessels, while 
bound for German ports with cotton and 
similar cargoes, had run on mines, ap- 
parently as the consequence of accident. 
Four lives were lost, three being Spanish 
sailors and one American. 

Q. — When was the first American 
ship torpedoed? 

A— On May 1, the American steamship 
Gulflight, bound for Rouen, France, when 
25 miles off Bishops Rock, England, was 
picked up by two British patrol boats at 
11 a.m., and directed to follow them to- 
ward the lighthouse. At 12.50 p.m., a 
heavy explosion occurred on the starboard 
side, half an hour after a submarine had 
been seen about two miles off. The wire- 
less operator and a sailor jumped over- 
board and were drowned. The others 
were taken aboard the patrol boat where 
the captain died from heart failure. The 
vessel was towed into port. 

Q. — When was the "Lusitania" tor- 
pedoed? 

A. — On May 7, 1915, within three 
months after the German war-zone decree 
went into effect. She was sunk near the 
Irish coast without warning. Of the 1,154 
lives that were lost, 114 were American. 



America's Principles for W orld-Settlement 



Q._What did America do after the 
"Lusitania" sinking? 

A. — Six days after the sinking, the 
government demanded (under date of 
May 13, 1915) that the German Govern- 
ment disavow the acts of the submarine 
commanders who had sunk the British 
ships Lusitania and Falaba with Ameri- 
cans on board, the American ship Gulf- 
light and also the aeroplane attack on the 
American ship Gushing. Further demands 
were for "reparation so far as reparation 
is possible for injuries which are without 
measure," and that the German Govern- 
ment "take immediate steps to prevent the 
recurrence of anything so obviously sub- 
versive of the principles of warfare for 
which the German Imperial Government 
have in the past so wisely and so firmly 
contended." 

Q. — What did we announce as our 
intention ? 

A. — We declared, "The Imperial Ger- 
man Government will not expect the Gov- 
ernment of the United States to omit any 
word or any act necessary to the per- 
formance of its sacred duty of maintain- 
ing the rights of the United States and its 
citizens and of safeguarding their free 
exercise and enjoyment." 

Q. — Did Germany torpedo Ameri- 
can ships after the ''Lusitania" 
sinking? 

A. — On May 25, 1915, the Nebraskan 
was torpedoed, but reached an English 
port. There were no deaths. Three sail- 
ors were injured. The German Govern- 
ment admitted the torpedoing, ascribed it 
to error and offered compensation. In the 
same note compensation was offered for 
the Gulflight. On July 25 the Leelanaw, 
returning from Archangel with flax for 
Belfast, Ireland, was stopped by a sub- 
marine off the Orkneys and after an ex- 
amination of her papers the crew was or- 
dered to leave the ship, which was then 
torpedoed. On August 19 followed the 
torpedoing of the White Star steamship 
Arabic, bound from Liverpool to New 
York with passengers, twenty of whom 
were drowned, among them being Ameri- 
can citizens. Germany made elaborate ex- 
planations in this case, sending to the 
United States the affidavits of the subma- 
rine's officers and crew to the effect that 
they believed the Arabic had approached 
deliberately to ram them ; but the German 
Government also admitted that it had no 



reason to doubt the affidavits of the Ara- 
bic's officers to the contrary. The case 
closed by the United States Government's 
acceptance of a disavowal and an offer to 
pay indemnity. 

Q. — What was the result of the 
"Arabic" case? 

A. — The German Ambassador at Wash- 
ington (von Bernstorff) gave the Ameri- 
can Government a formal declaration on 
September 1, 1915, that thereafter no lin- 
ers would be sunk without warning. 
There was a considerable easing of strain, 
further accentuated when on October 6 the 
German Government, through Bernstorff, 
declared to the American Government 
that its orders to submarines had been 
made so stringent that a recurrence of 
incidents similar to the Arabic case was 
considered out of the question. On No- 
vember 9, however, the whole matter was 
re-opened and assumed a most angry as- 
pect through the sinking of the Ancona. 

Q. — Was the "Ancona" an Ameri- 
can ship? 

A. — The Ancona was an Italian pas- 
senger steamship bound from Naples via 
Messina to New York. She carried 4 
first-class, 63 second-class, and 194 third- 
class passengers bound for America. 
Among them were a number of natural- 
ized American citizens. The Ancona was 
shelled until she stopped. Many were 
hurt and killed by this gunfire. Many 
others were drowned through the capsiz- 
ing of boats that were lowered while 
under way. Before all the passengers 
could get off, the submarine, which turned 
out to be an Austrian one, torpedoed and 
sank the ship. The American Government 
denounced the act in a note to the Aus- 
trian Government as "wanton slaughter 
of defenseless non-combatants," and de- 
manded that the Austrian Government 
confess that it was an illegal and inde- 
fensible act, that the commanding officer 
be punished, and that indemnity be paid. 
The Austrian Government made very 
halting explanations, but finally an- 
nounced that it had punished the com- 
mander and would pay indemnity, though 
the admissions were made in a manner 
that left them very unsatisfactory. 

Q. — Did the United States again 
propose rules for submarine 
war? 

A. — On January 18, 1916, the State De- 



IO 



Questions and Answers 



partment sent an "informal and confi- 
dential letter" to the British, French, Rus- 
sian, and Italian Ambassadors and the 
Belgian Minister, and on January 24 to 
the Japanese Ambassador, proposing these 
rules: (1) A noncombatant has the right 
to traverse the high seas in a merchant 
vessel entitled to fly a belligerent flag, 
and to rely upon the observance of inter- 
national law and humanity if the vessel is 
approached by a naval vessel of another 
belligerent; (2) a merchant vessel of en- 
emy nationality should not be attacked 
without being ordered to stop; (3) an 
enemy merchant vessel, when ordered to 
do so by a belligerent submarine, should 
immediately stop ; (4) such vessel should 
not be attacked after being ordered to stop 
unless it attempts to flee or to resist, and 
in case it ceases to flee or resist, the at- 
tack should discontinue; (5) in the event 
that it is impossible to place a prize crew 
on board of an enemy merchant vessel or 
convoy it into port, the vessel may be 
sunk, provided the crew and passengers 
have been removed to a place of safety. 

Q. — Was this proposal accepted by 
the belligerents? 

A. — No. To the five proposals the 
United States in this note added the sug- 
gestion that the entrance of the submarine 
had put a new aspect on the practice of 
arming merchant vessels for defense. It 
said that owing to the weakness of the 
submarine, "the placing of guns on mer- 
chantmen at the present day can be ex- 
plained only on the ground of purpose to 
render merchantmen superior in force to 
submarines and to prevent warning and 
visit and search by them. Any armament, 
therefore, on a merchant vessel would 
seem to have the character of an offensive 
armament." The Secretary of State 
added : "My Government is impressed 
with the reasonableness of the argument 
that a merchant vessel carrying an arma- 
ment of any sort, in view of the character 
of submarine warfare and the defensive 
weakness of the undersea craft, should be 
held to be an auxiliary cruiser, and so 
treated by a neutral as well as by a bel- 
ligerent government, and is seriously con- 
sidering instructing its officials accord- 
ingly." This view was opposed by a Brit- 
ish note of March 23, 1916, and on April 
7, 1016, the State Department withdrew 
its suggestion. 

Q. — When was the McLemore 
resolution introduced? 

A.; — In the spring of 1916. It was a 



resolution (not a statute) offered by Jeff 
McLemore, Congressman at large from 
Texas, warning American citizens not to 
travel on foreign armed merchant ves- 
sels. The President informed Congress 
that he objected seriously to the passage 
of the resolution, holding that neutral sub- 
jects had the right to travel on a bellig- 
erent merchant vessel, even though de- 
fensively armed. After acute debate and 
following swift parliamentary maneuver- 
ing, a proposition to table the resolution 
was successful, and it was tabled by a 
vote of 276 to 152. 



-When was the 
pedoed? 



'Sussex" tor- 



A. — The Sussex, a British Channel 
steamer with Americans on board, was 
torpedoed in the Channel on March 24, 
1916. About 80 passengers, including 
Americans, were killed or injured. Ger- 
many at first claimed that the submarine 
commander had sunk a warship at the 
place indicated (about midway between 
Folkestone and Dieppe). On April 18, 
1916, the United States stated that the 
evidence was conclusive, and that "the 
commanders of the Imperial Government's 
undersea vessels have carried on practices 
of such ruthless destruction which have! 
made it more and more evident that the 
Imperial Government has found it im- 
practicable to put any such restraints on 
them as it had hoped and promised to 
put. . . . The roll of Americans who have 
lost their lives upon ships thus attacked 
and destroyed has grown month by month 
until the ominous toll has mounted into 
the hundreds." 



Q, — Did the United States threaten 
war because of the "Sussex"? 

A. — The Washington Government con- 
cluded its solemn protest by saying: "If 
it is still the purpose of the Imperial Gov- 
ernment to prosecute relentless and indis- 
criminate warfare against vessels of com- 
merce by the use of submarines without 
regard to what the Government of the 
United States must consider as the sa- 
cred and indisputable rules of interna- 
tional law and the universally recognized 
dictates of humanity, the Government of 
the United States is at last forced to the 
conclusion that there is but one course it 
can pursue. Unless the Imperial Govern- 
ment should now immediately declare and 
effect an abandonment of its present meth- 
ods of submarine warfare against passen- 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



ii 



ger and freight-carrying vessels, the Gov- 
ernment of the United States can have no 
choice but to sever diplomatic relations 
with the German Empire altogether. This 
action the Government of the United 
States contemplates with the greatest re- 
luctance, but feels constrained to take in 
behalf of humanity and the rights of neu- 
tral nations." 



Q. — Did Germany change its atti- 
tude as a result of the "Sussex" 
protest? 

A. — On May 4, 1916, the German Gov- 
ernment sent a long answer repeating its 
charges of previous violations of inter- 
national laws by its enemies, but making 
the statement that the German naval 
forces had received the order : "In ac- 
cordance with the general principles of 
visit and search and destruction of mer- 
chant vessels recognized by international 
law, such vessels, both within and with- 
out the area declared as naval war-zone, 
shall not be sunk without warning and 
without saving human lives, unless these 
ships attempt to escape or offer resist- 
ance." 

Q. — Was the pledge unconditional? 

A. — No. The note stated that Ger- 
many was confident that in consequence 
of the new orders, the United States "will 
now consider all impediments removed 
which may have been in the way of a 
mutual co-operation towards the restora- 
tion of the freedom of the seas . . . and 
it does not doubt that the Government of 
the United States will now demand that 
the British Government shall forthwith 
observe the rules of international law as 
they are laid down in the notes presented 
by the Government of the United States 
to the British Government on December 
28, 1914, and November 5, 1915. Should 
the^ steps taken by the Government of the 
United States not attain the object, the 
German Government would then be fac- 
ing a new situation, in which it must re- 
serve itself complete liberty of action." 

Q. — Did the United States accept 
this condition? 

A.— No. On May 8, 1916, the Depart- 
ment of State responded, saying that the 
United States would "rely upon a scrupu- 
lous execution henceforth of the now al- 
tered policy of the Imperial Government, 
such as will remove the principal danger 



to an interruption of the good relations 
existing between the United States and 
Germany. The Government of the United 
States feels it necessary to state that it 
takes it for granted that the Imperial 
German Government does not intend to 
imply that the maintenance of its newly 
announced policy is in any way contin- 
gent upon the course or result of diplo- 
matic negotiations between the United 
States and any other belligerent govern- 
ment. In order to avoid any possible 
misunderstanding, the Government of the 
United States notifies the Imperial Gov- 
ernment that it cannot for a moment en- 
tertain, much less, discuss, a suggestion 
that respect by German naval authorities 
for the rights of citizens upon the high 
seas should in any way or in the slightest 
degree be made contingent upon the con- 
duct of any other government affecting 
the rights of neutrals and noncombatants." 

Q. — What famous phrase did the 
United States use? 

A. — At the conclusion of the note the 
United States used the phrase : "Respon- 
sibility in such matters is single, not joint; 
absolute, not relative." 

Q. — Did the German Government 
reply to this American note? 

A. — No. Germany apparently pursued 
the policy of "standing pat" on its note, 
and the United States did the same. 

Q. — What were the American notes 
referred to by Germany? 

A. — The American note of December 
28, 1914 (dated .December 26), protested 
against the British seizures. 

Americans have long been thinking more 
of the superb record made by the people 
and armies of Great Britain than of any 
former differences. 

The reason for referring to this is that 
the Germans, and German sympathizers, 
have repeatedly tried to excuse their own 
illegal acts by classing them as at worst in 
the some category as those of the Allies. 

Let us make the matter perfectly clear. 

It is probably true that Great Britain 
was forced to adopt an extreme interpre- 
tation as to contraband and "continuous 
voyage" — just as the North did in the 
American Civil War; and impartial his- 
torians of the future may decide that this 
wrought some injury to property rights 
of neutrals. 



12 



Questions and Answers 



But even admitting this, such acts are 
a whole world apart from the savage 
wholesale destruction of life and property 
deliberately adopted by the German gov- 
ernment as a war measure. 

Two gentlemen might easily disagree as 
to their rights and appeal to law — without 
being classed with the ruffian who tried 
to murder a roomful of innocent people 
in order to reach his enemy. 

Q. — How many American lives had 
been destroyed by submarine 
warfare up to the time of our 
entrance into war? 

A. — In all 226 American citizens, men, 
women and children, had lost their lives 
through the action of German submarines. 
Among the cases were: Lusitania, 114 
Americans ; Arabic, 3 ; Hesperian, I ; Ma- 
rina, 8; Russian, 17; Laconia, 8; Vigilan- 
cia, 5; Healdton, 7; Aztec, 28. Of these 
ships the Vigilancia, Healdton and Aztec 
were American vessels. 

Q.— Why did the United States 
dismiss the Austro-Hungarian 
ambassador? 

A. — The United States demanded that 
the Austro-Hungarian Government recall 
its Ambassador, Constantin Dumba, be- 
cause he had "admitted that he proposed 
to his Government plans to instigate 
strikes in_ American manufacturing plants 
engaged in the production of munitions 
of war." He had sent a letter to his 
government through an American citizen, 
traveling under an American passport, 
whqse papers were seized by the British. 
The demand for his recall was made Sept- 
ember 8, 1915, and was acceded to by his 
government September 30. 

Q. — Did we refuse to receive an 
Austrian ambassador before 
we entered war with Ger- 
many? 

A. — Yes. After the first Ambassador, 
Dr. Dumba, received his passports, Aus- 
tria was represented in Washington for 
some time by minor legation officials. 
Diplomatic relations, however, had not 
been broken, and our Ambassador to 
Vienna, Penfield, remained accredited to 
that court. After some time, Austria- 
Hungary appointed^a new Ambassador to 
the United States, but he was not received 
because the Austro-Hungarian Govern- 
ment had avowed its unqualified endorse- 



ment and acceptance of the German un- 
restricted submarine warfare decree. 

Q. — Who severed diplomatic rela- 
tions — we or Austria-Hun- 
gary? 

A.— On April 8, 1917, Joseph Clark 
Grew, Charge d' Affaires of the United 
States at Vienna in the absence of Am- 
bassador Penfield, informed Washington 
that the Austrian Minister for Foreign 
Affairs had just notified him that diplo- 
matic relations were broken and had 
given him his passports. The ground 
given by the Austrian Government was 
the existence of war between its ally, 
Germany, and the United States. 

Q. — Was the German ambassador 
recalled by his Government? 

A. — No. The German Ambassador, J. 
von Bernstorff, remained accredited to 
this country until February 3, 1917, when 
the_ United States severed diplomatic re- 
lations with Qermany, and gave him his 
passports. 

Q. — When did the United States 
dismiss members of his lega- 
tion? 

A. — On December 4, 1915, the govern- 
ment informed Ambassador Bernstorff 
that "various facts and circumstances 
having come to the knowledge of the 
Government of the United States as to the 
connection of Captain Boy-Ed, Naval at- 
tache, and Captain von Papen, Military 
Attache, of the Imperial German Em- 
bassy, with the illegal and questionable 
acts of certain persons within the United 
States, the President reached the convic- 
tion that the continued presence of these 
gentlemen as Attaches of the Embassy 
would no longer serve the purpose of 
their mission, and would be unacceptable 
to this Government." On December 10 
the German Ambassador replied that his 
government had recalled them, and they 
sailed soon afterward. 

Q. — When was the first important 
peace proposal made by any 
belligerent? 

A.— In a note to the United States from 
Berlin dated December 12, 1916, and 
signed von Bethman-Hollweg (the Ger- 
man Imperial Chancellor). This note, 
after pointing to the strength and mili- 



America's Principles for W orld-Settlement 



13 



tary position of Germany, Austria-Hun- 
gary. Bulgaria and Turkey, stated : "They 
do not seek to crush or annihilate their 
adversaries. Conscious of their military 
and economic strength, and ready to carry 
on the end, if they must, the four Allied 
Powers propose to enter even now into 
peace negotiations," and asked the United 
States Government to transmit the offer 
to the Allied Governments. Identical 
notes were sent by Austria-Hungary, Bul- 
garia and Turkey. 



Q. — Did the notes indicate any spe- 
cific peace aims? 

A. — No. The only indication of their 
purposes was in the following sentence: 
"They" (i.e., the Central Allies) "feel 
sure that the propositions which they 
would bring forward and which would 
aim to assure the existence, honor and 
free development of their peoples, would 
be such as to serve as a basis for the 
restoration of a lasting peace. ... If 
notwithstanding this offer of peace and 
conciliation, the struggle should continue, 
the four Allied Powers are resolved to 
carry it on to a victorious end while sol- 
emnly disclaiming any responsibility be- 
fore mankind and history." 



Q. — What was the military situa- 
tion when this proposal was 
made? 



A — On December 12, 1916, when these 
peace notes issued from the various Cen- 
tra 1 capitals, the military situation on the 
Western Front was a deadlock. The Ger- 
man assault on the Verdun sector, begun 
on February of 1916, had ceased by July 
with little advantage in position. The 
Germans had gained ground, but had paid 
heavily in lives, and they had wholly 
failed to reduce Verdun itself. The Brit- 
ish and French farther west had con- 
ducted a series of very large offensives 
from July to November, with an equal 
failure to do more than gain some ground, 
and with equally heavy losses. On the 
Eastern Front Russia was disintegrating. 
The Germans had proclaimed a new king- 
dom of Poland five weeks before they 
made peace proposals and they had prac- 
tically completed the conquest of Rou- 
mania, having occupied the capital, Bucha- 
rest, just six days before the date of their 
note. 



Q. — Had the United States not in- 
tended to make representations 
to the belligerents? 

A. — Yes. It was generally known that 
the government was considering the is- 
suance of a note to all the belligerents, 
suggesting an attempt to discuss peace 
terms or at least to indicate what terms 
would be likely to offer grounds for dis- 
cussion. 



Q. — Did the United States state 
this fact officially? 

A. — The Department of State, in send- 
ing out the Central Powers' proposal to 
the various Embassies, stated that the 
Government "will itself presently have 
certain very earnest representations to 
make on behalf of the manifest interests 
of neutral nations and of humanity itself, 
to which it will ask that very serious con- 
sideration be given. It does not make 
their representations now, because it does 
not wish to connect them with the pro- 
posed overtures, or have them construed 
in any way as an attempt at mediation, 
notwithstanding that these overtures af- 
ford an admirable occasion for their con- 
sideration. The Government of the 
United States had in mind to make them 
entirely on its own initiative, and before 
it had any knowledge of the present atti- 
tude or suggestions of the Central Gov- 
ernments." 



Q. — Did the Allied Governments 
reply to the German peace pro- 
posal? 

A. — Under date of "Paris, Decem- 
ber 29, 1916," and transmitted through 
Ambassador Sharp to Washington, the 
Governments of Belgium, France, Great 
Britain, Italy, Japan, Montenegro, Por- 
tugal, Roumania, Russia and Serbia an- 
swered in a joint note. 

Q. — What was the tenor of the 
Allied reply? 

A. — It began with a protest against "the 
two essential assertions which attempt to 
throw upon the Allies the responsibility 
for the war and which proclaim the vic- 
tory of the Central Powers ... an asser- 
tion which is sufficient, to render barren 
any attempt at negotiation." After re- 
capitulating European history leading to 
the war, and pointing out that German 



14 



Questions and Answers 



offers were based on a "war map," which 
expressed not the real strength of the op- 
posing forces, the statement was made : 
"For the future, the ruins caused by the 
Germans' declaration of war, the innumer- 
able agressions committed by Germany 
and her allies against belligerents and 
neutrals, demand penalties, reparations, 
and guarantees ; Germany eludes one and 
all." 



Q. — Did the Allied reply decline 
negotiations positively? 

A. — Quite positively, in the following 
words : "It is with a full realization of 
the gravity, but also the necessities, of 
this hour that the Allied Governments, 
closely united and in perfect communion 
with their peoples refuse to entertain a 
proposal without sincerity and without im- 
port." 

Q. — Did the Allies indicate what 
terms were demanded? 

A. — Their joint note said: "They" (i.e., 
the Allied Powers) "affirm once again 
that no peace is possible as long as the 
reparation of violated rights and liberties, 
the acknowledgment of the principle of 
nationalities and of the free existence of 
small states shall not be assured ; as long 
as there is no assurance of a settlement 
to suppress definitely the causes which 
for so long a time have menaced nations 
and to give the only efficacious guar- 
antees for the security of the world." 
No territory or nation was mentioned 
specifically, except Belgium. After nar- 
rating Belgium's specific wrongs, they 
said : "They will only consider a peace 
which Belgian citizens believe as- 
sures to their country legitimate repara- 
tion, guarantees and security for their 
future." 

Q. — Had the United States made 
its independent suggestion to 
the belligerents before this 
reply was issued? 

A. — On December 18, 1916, the Depart- 
ment of State had sent to all the belliger- 
ents a note which, after making it ab- 
solutely clear that it had in no sense been 
suggested by the action of the Central 
Powers, said : "The President suggests 
that an early occasion be sought to call 
out from all the nations now at war such 
an avowal of their respective views as 
to the terms upon which the war might 
be concluded and the arrangements which 



would be deemed satisfactory as a guar- 
anty against its renewal or the kindling of 
any similar conflict in the future, as would 
make it possible frankly to compare 
them." 

Q. — What was the purpose of this 
note? 

A. — The statement regarding it in 
"How the War Came to America" (Com- 
mittee on Public Information) is: 

"There was still hope in our minds that 
the mutual suspicions between the war- 
ring powers might be decreased, and the 
menace of future German aggression and 
dominance be removed, by finding a guar- 
anty of good faith in a League of Na- 
tions. There was a chance that by the 
creation of such a league as part of the 
peace negotiations, the war could now be 
brought to an end before our Nation was 
involved." 

Q. — Did the American note pre- 
sent a possible basis of agree- 
ment? 

A. — It did. It said that the President 
"takes the liberty of calling attention to 
the fact that the objects which the states- 
men of the belligerents on both sides have 
in mind in this war are virtually the same, 
as stated in general terms to their own 
people and to the world. Each side de- 
sires to make the rights and privileges of 
weak peoples and small states as secure 
against aggression or denial in the future 
as the rights and privileges of the great 
and powerful states now at war. Each 
wishes itself to be made secure in the fu- 
ture, along with all other nations and 
peoples, against the recurrence of wars 
like this and against aggression or selfish 
interference of any kind. Each would be 
jealous of the formation of any more 
rival leagues to preserve an uncertain bal- 
ance of power amidst multiplying sus- 
picions ; but each is ready to consider the 
formation of a league of nations to in- 
sure peace and justice throughout the 
world." 

Q. — Did the President inquire for 
specific peace terms? 

A. — Yes. He said : "The concrete ob- 
jects for which it (war) is being waged, 
have never been definitively stated. . . . 
Never yet have the authoritative spokes- 
men of either side avowed the precise ob- 
jects which would, if attained, satisfy 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



15 



them and their people that the war had 
been fought out. The world has been 
left to conjecture what definitive results, 
what actual exchange of guarantees, what 
political or territorial changes or read- 
justments, what stage of military success 
even, would bring the war to an end. It 
may be that peace is nearer than we 
know; that the terms which the belliger- 
ents would deem it necessary to insist 
upon are not so irreconciliable as some 
have feared ; that an interchange of views 
would clear the way at least to a confer- 
ence and make the permanent concord of 
the nations a hope of the immediate fu- 
ture, a concert of nations immediately 
practicable." 



Q. — Did the American note pro- 
pose mediation? 

A. — It said : "The President is not pro- 
posing peace ; he is not even proposing 
mediation. He is merely proposing that 
soundings be taken in order that we may 
learn how near the haven of peace may 
be for which all mankind longs with an 
intense and increased longing." 



Q. — Which belligerent made the 
first reply? 

A. — The Central Powers. A note dated 
December 26, 1916, was dispatched from 
Berlin, saying that the Imperial Govern- 
ment "has accepted and considered in the 
friendly spirit which is apparent in the 
communication of the President, the noble 
initiative looking to the creation of bases 
for the foundation of a lasting peace. A 
direct exchange of views appears to the 
Imperial Government the most suitable 
way of arriving at the desired result. 
The Imperial Government has the honor, 
therefore, to propose the speedy assembly, 
on neutral ground, of delegates of the 
warring States." Austria-Hungary and 
Turkey made the same reply, same date. 
Bulgaria replied in the same sense on De- 
cember 30, 1916. 



Q. — Was this reply at all satisfac- 
tory? 

A. — "The German reply was evasive — in 
accordance with their traditional prefer- 
ence for diplomacy behind closed doors," 
says the Committee on Public Informa- 
tion in "How the War Came to America." 
"Refusing to state to the world their 
terms, Germany and her allies merelj 



proposed a conference. They adjourned 
all discussion of any plan for a league 
of peace until after hostilities should 
end." 

Q. — When did the Allied Powers 

reply? 

A. — They replied with a joint note 
dated from Paris, January 10, 1917. Thus 
their reply was not only a reply to the 
President's note, but it was also a reply 
to the Central Powers' reply to that note. 
On the same date Belgium made a sepa- 
rate, or rather additional reply, restating 
her own grievous case most eloquently 
and declaring that she must have "equit- 
able reparation, security and guarantees 
for the future." 



Q. — Did the Allied note decline a 
conference? 

A. — It did in a sentence which read : 
"But a discussion of future arrangements 
destined to insure an enduring peace pre- 
supposes a satisfactory settlement of the 
actual conflict. . . . They believe it is im- 
possible at the present moment to attain 
a peace which will assure them repara- 
tion, restitution, and such guarantees to 
which they are entitled." They protested 
against "the assimilation established in 
the American note between the two groups 
of belligerents." 

Q. — What specific terms did the 
Allied note declare? 

A. — After declaring that their objects 
had been formulated many times by their 
Governments and were well known, they 
said that their objects (presumably mean- 
ing the detailed objects) "will not be 
made known in detail with all the equit- 
able compensations and indemnities for 
damages suffered until the hour of nego- 
tiations. But the civilized world knows 
that they imply in all necessity and in 
the first instance the restoration of Bel- 
gium, of Serbia and of Montenegro and 
the indemnities which are due them ; the 
evacuation of the invaded territories of 
France, of Russia and of Roumania with 
just reparation; the reorganization of 
Europe, guaranteed by a stable regime 
and founded as much upon respect of na- 
tionalities and full security and liberty, 
economic development, which all nations 
great and small possess, as upon terri- 
torial conventions and international agree- 
ments suitable to guarantee territorial and 



i6 



Questions and Answers 



maritime frontiers against unjustified at- 
tacks ; the restitution of provinces or ter- 
ritories wrested in the past from the Allies 
by force or against the will of their popu- 
lations, the liberation of Italians, of Slavs, 
of Roumanians and of Czecho-Slovaks 
from foreign domination ; the enfranchise- 
ment of populations subject to the bloody 
tyranny of the Turks; the expulsion of 
the Ottoman Empire from Europe. The 
intentions of His Majesty the Emperor 
of Russia regarding Poland have been 
clearly indicated in the proclamation 
which he has just addressed to his ar- 



Q. — What was American opinion 
after this interchange? 

A. — It is expressed in the following, 
from "How the War Came to America," 
quoted previously: 

"The response of the Entente Powers 
was frank and in harmony with our prin- 
cipal purpose. Many questions raised in 
the statement of their aims were so purely 
European in character as to have small 
interest for us ; but our great concern in 
Europe was the lasting restoration of 
peace, and it was clear that this was also 
the chief interest of the Entente Nations. 
As to the wisdom of some of the meas- 
ures they proposed toward this end, we 
might differ in opinion, but the trend of 
their proposals was the establishment of 
just frontiers based on the rights of all 
nations, the small as well as the great, to 
decide their own destinies. 

"The aims of the belligerents were now 
becoming clear. From the outbreak of 
hostilities the German Government had 
claimed that it was fighting a war of de- 
fense. But the tone of its recent pro- 
posals had been that of a conqueror. It 
sought a peace based on victory. The 
central empires aspired to extend their 
domination over other races. They were 
willing to make liberal terms to any one 
of their enemies, in a separate peace which 
would free their hands to crush other op- 
ponents. But they were not willing to 
accept any peace which did not, all fronts 
considered, leave them victors and the 
dominating imperial power of Europe. 
The war aims of the Entente showed a 
determination to thwart this ambition of 
the Imperial German Government. 
Against the German Peace to further 
German growth and aggression the En- 
tente Powers offered a plan for a Euro- 
pean Peace that should make the whole 
Continent secure." 



Q. — Had the treaties concerning 
any of these settlements been 
published at the time of this 
interchange of notes? 

A. — No. They were not made public 
until after the overthrow of the Czar's 
Government an J trie subsequent overthrow 
of the Kerensky Government. Soon after 
the Russian Revolution the extreme so- 
cialists had demanded publication of 
treaties, but the Kerensky Government 
failed to accede. When the Bolshevik 
Government succeeded Kerensky in No- 
vember, 1917, the treaties were published 
in full, with a statement by Trotzky that 
secret diplomacy was one of the evils 
which the new regime intended to elim- 
inate. Trotzky added : "The bourgeois 
politicians and scribblers of Austria-Hun- 
gary and Germany may attempt to make 
use of the published documents to present 
in a favorable light the diplomatic efforts 
of the Central Empires. But any attempt 
in this direction will be doomed to com- 
plete and sorry failure. Firstly, we in- 
tend to produce shortly before the judg- 
ment of public opinion the secret docu- 
ments which characterize quite sharply 
the diplomacy of the Central Empires ; 
and secondly — and this is of greater im- 
portance — the methods of secret diplomacy 
are just as international as is imperialistic 
rapacity itself." 

Q. — What was the most important 
of these treaties? 

A. — Perhaps it was the treaty between 
Italy and France, Great Britain and Rus- 
sia, signed about a fortnight before Italy 
entered the war (against Austria-Hun- 
gary alone, May 23, 1915). This treaty 
after setting forth the military efforts to 
be made by Italy, provided that Italy was 
to receive : the Trentino district ; entire 
southern Tyrol to the river Brenner ; 
Trieste, Goritzia, Gradisca and their sub- 
urbs ; all of Istria and Dalmatia (the 
coastal lands on the Eastern Adriatic op- 
posite Italy) and various enumerated is- 
land archipelagoes on that coast ; the right 
to conduct the foreign relations of Al- 
bania, in case that country were erected 
into a small autonomous neutralized State ; 
on the division of Turkey, an equal share 
with France, Great Britain and Russia in 
the basin of the Mediterranean and espe- 
cially contiguous to Adalia (a coastal strip 
in Asiatic Turkey facing the Mediter- 
ranean between Crete and Cyprus) ; all 
rights acquired by the Sultan in Libya 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



17 



(the northern part of Egypt on the Medi- 
terranean lying between the Nile and 
Tripoli on the west) ; in the event of ex- 
pansion of French and English colonial 
domains at the expense of Germany, Italy 
to have the right to demand compensa- 
tions in the shape of expansions of her 
lands in Erithea (on the African Red 
Sea coast north of Abyssinia), Somaliland 
(on the Indian Ocean just south of the 
Gulf of Aden), Libya, and colonial dis- 
tricts lying on the boundary with the colo- 
nies of France and Great Britain ; such 
share of the military contribution as cor- 
responds with the sacrifices made ; non- 
admittance of the Holy See to diplomatic 
steps for conclusion of peace or regula- 
tion of questions arising from the war. 

Q. — What were the other treaties? 

A. — One was an agreement (dated Feb- 
ruary 1-14, 1917) by which France was to 
include in her terms of peace the follow- 
ing: (1) Alsace and Lorraine to be re- 
returned; (2) boundaries to be extended 
to at least the limits of the former prin- 
cipality of Lorraine and fixed under di- 
rection of the French Government; (3) 
whole of the industrial iron basin of 
Lorraine and whole of industrial coal- 
basin of Valley of the Saar (between 
Lorraine, the Palatinate and the River 
Moselle ; (4) other territories on the left 
bank of the Rhine and not included in 
the composition of the German Empire 
to be completely separated from Germany 
and freed from all political and economic 
dependence on her; (5) the territory on 
the left bank of the Rhine not included 
in the composition of French territory to 
form an autonomous and neutral govern- 
ment, and to be occupied by French armies 
till the enemy government completely ful- 
fills all the conditions and guarantees in 
the treaty of peace. The other treaties 
and agreements concerned Russia's free- 
dom to fix her Western boundaries and 
her right to take Constantinople, western 
shores of the Bosphorus, Sea of Mar- 
mora, and the Dardanelles, shores of Asia 
Minor and certain islands to go to Rus- 
sia; the special rights of France and of 
Great Britain within those territories to 
remain undisturbed. There were other 
agreements concerning territorial offers to 
Roumania and Greece which lost their 
importance after the peace treaty between 
Roumania and the Central Powers and 
the change of government in Greece. 

Q. — What was the "Willy and 
Nicky" correspondence? 

A. — It was a series of letters and dis- 



patches between Emperor William and 
the late Czar, dating between 1904 and 
1907, and so-called because the two mon- 
archs addressed each other with those 
names. The Provisional Government of 
Russia made them public. They dealt 
with efforts to rescue the autocratic Rus- 
sian Government from the critical political 
condition into which it had sunk as a re- 
sult of the Russo-Japanese War ; and with 
other efforts toward a Russo-German al- 
liance against Great Britain and a sever- 
ance of the Russo-French alliance. An 
interesting part of the letters was a ref- 
erence to the probable necessity of Russo- 
German occupation of Denmark if the 
Baltic Sea were menaced by attack from 
other Powers in case of war. 



Q. — Was it at this time that Presi- 
dent Wilson uttered his fa- 
mous statement about secret 
diplomacy? 

A. — No. _ This great utterance, which 
was recognized throughout the world as 
going boldly and straight to the root of 
the evil intrigues which did more than 
anything else to maintain the menace of 
wars in the world, was in his Message to 
Congress on the basis of a possible world- 
peace, January 8, 1918. He there laid 
down certain world-principles which must 
be adopted if international relations were 
to be on a better basis. The very first 
principle in that program was : "Open 
covenants of peace, openly arrived at, 
after which there shall be no private in- 
ternational understandings of any kind, 
but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly 
and in the public view." 



Q. — Had the German Government 
intrigued secretly against 
America when it made its 
peace proposals? 

A. — In the address by the President to 
a joint session of both houses of Con- 
gress, asking that Germany's course be 
declared war against the United States 
(April 2, 1917, less than 4 months after 
the German peace proposal was sent to the 
United States), the following statement 
was made : 

"One of the things that has served to 
convince us that the Prussian autocracy 
was not and could never be our friend is 
that from the very outset of the present 
war it has filled our unsuspecting com- 
munities and even our offices of govern- 



i8 



Questions and Answers 



ment with spies and set criminal in- 
trigues everywhere afoot against our 
national unity of counsel, our peace 
within and without, our industries and 
our commerce. Indeed, it is now evi- 
dent that its spies were here even be- 
fore war began ; and it is unhappily not 
a matter of conjecture but a fact proved 
in our courts of justice that the intrigues 
which have come more than once peril- 
ously near to disturbing the peace and 
dislocating the industries of the coun- 
try have been carried on at the instiga- 
tion, with the support and even under 
the personal direction of official agents 
of the Imperial Government accredited 
to the Government of the United 
States." 



Q. — Did we have evidence of these 
things ? 

A. — "The information . . . was drawn 
from a varied body of documentary ma- 
terial : telegrams from the German Gov- 
ernment to its diplomatic representatives 
in the United States ; letters and telegrams 
exchanged by them with their hired 
agents here; records of financial dealings, 
as checks, receipts, bank books, deposit 
slips, orders to bank that money be paid 
and acknowledgments thereof ; reports of 
subordinates to superiors ; hotel registers 
and lists of telephone calls. Of particular 
value are the counterfoils and stubs in 
the check book of Captain von Papen, on 
which he habitually recorded memoranda 
revealing the purpose for which the checks 
were drawn, and the cash book of Wolf 
von Igel, von Papen's secretary, with its 
daily record of persons to whom he made 
payments. 

"Another rich mine of information has 
resulted from the legal prosecution of 
certain of her agents here for criminal 
acts. This evidence includes confessions 
by accused persons and their confederates 
to United States officials, examinations 
before Government officials, and testimony 
offered in the courts of law." (German 
Plots and Intrigues: Committee on Pub- 
lic Information.) 

Q. — What had been the wrongful 
activities of Germany within 
the United States? 

A. — When the House of Representatives 
Committee on Foreign Affairs brought 
in the War Resolution, it recorded for- 
mally the following: Organizing Hindu 



plots against Great Britain's Indian Em- 
pire ; preparing fraudulent passports for 
German reservists; equipping agents with 
American passports to do espionage in 
England ; outfitting ships to suppTy Ger- 
man warships on the high seas ; attempt to 
blow up the international bridge between 
the United States and Canada; furnish- 
ing funds for men to destroy Canadian 
munition works ; conspiring to blow up 
tunnels and bridges in Canada and to 
place bombs on board of ships leaving the 
United States ; financing newspapers to 
conduct propaganda; seeking to embroil 
Mexico. 



Q. — What were the Hindu plots? 

A. — The German Government gave aid 
to members of the India Nationalist 
Party, which has long aimed to overthrow 
British rule in India by means of armed 
rebellion. In March, 1917, the Federal 
Grand Jury in San Francisco indicted the 
German Consul-General in that city, Franz 
Bopp, with his Vice-Consul, Eckhart H. 
von Schack; William von Brincken, 
Hans Tauscher, F. von Papen, German 
military attache; George Rodiek (Ger- 
man Consul at Honolulu) ; Earnest Se- 
kunna, Wolf von Igel, von Papen's sec- 
retary ; Har Dayal, Ram Chandra, Bhag- 
wan Singh, Chandra Kanta Chakrabarty, 
and Haramba Lai Gupta, "for feloniously 
conspiring to set on foot a military en- 
terprise to be carried on from within the 
territory of the United States against 
India . . . the object and purpose being 
to initiate mutiny and armed rebellion 
in India and to overthrow the Govern- 
ment." 

It was proved that large sums had been 
spent and that attempts had been made to 
ship quantities of arms to India. All those 
indicted were convicted in 1918, except 
one American of minor importance and 
two Hindus, one of whom killed the other 
and in turn was killed in the courtroom 
by a court official. 

Another branch of the conspiracy in 
Chicago resulted in the conviction there 
of German agents and Indian revolution- 
ists in October, 1917. 



Q. — What were the attempts 
against Canada? 

A. — Horst von der Goltz, by orders of 
the German General Staff and through 
direct aid from Captain von Papen, tried 
to engineer the destruction of the Wel- 
land Canal, grain elevators at Fort Wil- 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



19 



Ham, and if possible the Sault Ste-Marie 
locks and railroad bridges. Another at- 
tempt was made by Paul Koenig, head of 
the Bureau of Investigation of the Ham- 
burg-American line, to hire men to blow 
up the Welland Canal. Albert Kalt- 
schmidt, a wealthy citizen of the German 
Empire living in Detroit, organized at- 
tempts to blow up factories in Walker- 
ville, Canada, the armory in Windsor, the 
Canadian Pacific Railroad bridges at Nipi- 
gon, and the St. Clair Tunnel connecting 
Canada and the United States. Kalt- 
schmidt and his associates were indicted 
and found guilty in December, 1917. He 
was sentenced to 4 years in Leavenworth 
and to pay a fine of $20,000. His sister 
was sentenced to 3 years in the House of 
Correction and fined $15,000. Her hus- 
band, Fritz A. Neef, got 2 years at Leav- 
enworth and was fined $10,000. Werner 
Horn, a German Reserve Lieutenant, 
under orders from Captain von Papen, 
partly blew up the Grand Trunk Rail- 
way Bridge near Vanceboro, Maine. He 
confessed and was sentenced to 18 months 
in Atlanta and $1,000 fine. Franz Bopp, 
German Consul-General in San Francisco, 
hired men to blow up the tunnels of the 
Canadian Pacific Railroad in British Co- 
lumbia. Bopp, Vice-Consul von Schack, 
Lieutenant von Brincken, one Crowley and 
his Secretary, Mrs. Cornell, were found 
guilty and sentenced to various terms and 
fines. 

Q. — Was the German Govern- 
ment's connection established? 

A. — Yes, by the following intercepted 
telegrams sent in January, 1916, to Am- 
bassador von Bernstorff : 

Jan. 3. (Secret.) General Staff desires 
energetic action in regard to proposed de- 
struction of Canadian Pacific Railway at 
several points with a view to complete 
and protracted interruption of traffic. 
Captain Boehm, who is known on your 
side and shortly returning, has been given 
instructions. Inform the Military At- 
tache and provide the necessary funds. 
(Signed) Zimmermann. 

Jan. 26. For Military Attache. You 
can obtain particulars as to persons suit- 
able for carrying on sabotage in the 
United States and Canada from the fol- 
lowing persons: (1) Joseph McGarrity, 
Philadelphia, Penn. (2) John P. Keat- 
ing, Michigan Avenue, Chicago. (3) Jere- 
miah O'Leary, 16 Park Row, New York. 
One and two are absolutely reliable and 
discreet. No. 3 is reliable, but not always 



discreet. These persons were indicated 
by Sir Roger Casement. In the United 
States sabotage can be carried out on 
every kind of factory for supplying mu- 
nitions of war. Railway embankments 
and bridges must not be touched. Em- 
bassy must in no circumstances be com- 
promised. Similar precautions must be 
taken in regard to Irish pro-German prop- 
aganda. 
(Signed) 

Representative of General Staff. 

Q. — How did German agents try 

to destroy ships? 

A. — By placing in their cargoes incen- 
diary bombs which should explode after 
a certain time. Between 300 and 400 
bombs were manufactured in New Jersey 
and fires were started on 33 ships sailing 
from New York. Dr. Walter T. Scheele, 
a chemist, Franz Rintelen, a noted Ger- 
man agent, Captain von Kleist, and nearly 
a dozen others were indicted and sent to 
prison for various terms with exception 
of some who fled. Robert Fay, a former 
German army officer, came to this country 
in 191 5 and endeavored to fix ingeniously 
contrived bombs to the rudders of mu- 
nition-laden ships to sink them at sea. He 
and two associates were sentenced to long 
terms in Atlanta. Consul-General Bopp 
was engaged in similar attempts on the 
Pacific Coast. 

Q. — What did the President say 
about German attempts to em- 
broil other nations against us? 

A.— He said in his war message : "That 
it" (i.e., the German Government) "means 
to stir up enemies against us at our very 
doors the intercepted note to the German 
Minister at Mexico City is eloquent evi- 
dence." 

Q. — What was this intercepted 
note? 

A.— It was a note from the German 
Minister for. Foreign Affairs, von Zim- 
mermann, dated "Berlin, Jan. 19, 1917." 
and addressed to the German Minister in 
Mexico. Its wording was : "On February 
1 we intend to begin submarine warfare 
unrestricted. In spite of this, it is our 
intention to keep neutral the United 
States. If this attempt is not successful, 
we propose an alliance on the following 
basis with Mexico: that we shall make 
war together and together make peace. 



20 



Questions and Answers 



We shall give general financial support, 
and it is understood that Mexico shall 
reconquer the lost territory in New Mex- 
ico, Texas and Arizona." The German 
Minister was instructed to open negotia- 
tions with President Carranza the moment 
war was inevitable, and to suggest to 
Carranza that he draw Japan into the al- 
liance. The note was intercepted by the 
United States and made public on March 
I, I9I7- 

Q. — Who referred to a peace with- 
out victory? 

A.— President Wilson used this famous 
term in an address to the United States 
Senate on January 22, 1917 (after his re- 
election) on essential terms of peace in 
Europe. It was after the German Gov- 
ernment had made a peace-proposal and 
the Allies had replied. He referred to 
the statements by both sides that they had 
no intention of crushing their antagonists 
and said : "But the implications of these 
assurances may not be equally clear to all 
— may not be the same on both sides of 
the water. I think it will be serviceable 
if I set forth what I understand them to 
be. They imply, first of all, a peace with- 
out victory." 

Q. — Did the President explain the 
meaning of "peace without 
victory"? 

A.— He did. He said: "I beg that I 
may be permitted to put my own interpre- 
tation upon it and that it may be under- 
stood that no other interpretation was in 
my thought. Victory would mean peace 
forced upon the loser, a victor's terms im- 
posed upon the vanquished. It would be 
accepted in humiliation, under duress, at 
an intolerable sacrifice, and would leave 
a sting, a resentment, a bitter memory 
upon which terms of peace would rest, not 
permanently, but only as upon quicksand. 
Only a peace between equals can last. 
Only a peace the very principle of which 
is equality and a common participation in 
a common benefit. The right state of 
mind, the right feeling between nations, 
is as necessary for a lasting peace as is 
the just settlement of vexed questions of 
territory or of racial and national al- 
legiance." 

Q. — What chief points did the spe- 
cial address on peace in Europe 
present? 

A. — In this Special Address, made 2% 



months before we entered war with Ger- 
many, the following were the points laid 
down as necessary for a sound peace : ( 1 ) 
an international concert which must 
thereafter hold the world at peace; (2) a 
peace to be made secure by the organized 
major force of mankind; (3) not a bal- 
ance of power, but a community of pow- 
ers ; (4) peoples not to be handed from 
sovereignty to sovereignty as if they were 
property; (5) a united, independent, and 
autonomous Poland; (6) security of life, 
worship, industrial and social development 
for people under governments of faith 
and purpose hostile to their own ; (7) di- 
rect access to the sea for all great peoples 
so far as possible ; (8) freedom of the 
seas ; (9) limitation of armaments on land 
and sea; (10) an adoption by all nations 
of the. doctrine of President Monroe as 
the doctrine of the world : that no nation 
should seek to extend its polity over any 
other nation or people; (11) all nations 
to avoid entangling alliances. 

Q. — Were specific war settlements 
suggested in this address? 

A. — Yes. It was in these words : "No 
peace can last, or ought to last, which 
does not recognize and accept the prin- 
ciple that governments derive all their 
just powers from the consent of the gov- 
erned, and that no right anywhere, exists 
to hand peoples about from sovereignty 
to sovereignty as if they were prop- 
erty. I take it for granted, for instance, 
if I may venture upon a single exam- 
ple, that statesmen everywhere are agreed 
that there should be a united, inde- 
pendent and autonomous Poland, and 
that henceforth inviolable security of 
life, of worship, and of industrial and 
social development should be guaranteed 
to all peoples who have lived hitherto 
under the power of governments devoted 
to a faith and purpose hostile to their 
own." 

Q. — What is the origin of "making 
the world safe for democracy"? 

A. — This famous phrase was in the 
Executive Address to Congress advising 
that Germany's course be declared war 
against the United States. (Delivered to 
Congress in Joint Session, April 2, 1917. ) 
The exact words were: "The world must 
be made safe for democracy. Its peace 
must be planted upon the tested founda- 
tions of national liberty. We have no 
selfish ends to serve. We desire no con- 
quest, no dominion. We seek no indem- 






America's Principles for World-Settlement 



21 



nities for ourselves, no material com- 
pensation for the sacrifices we shall 
freely make. We are but one of the 
champions of the rights of mankind. 
We shall be satisfied when those rights 
have been made as secure as the faith 
and the freedom of nations can make 
them." 

Q. — What is the meaning of "the 
battle line of democracy"? 

A. — It is a characterization used by 
President Wilson in a letter addressed in 
September, 1917, to the "American Al- 
liance of Labor and Democracy." Its ex- 
act wording was : "No one who is not 
blind can fail to see that the battle line 
of democracy for America stretches to- 
day from the fields of Flanders to every 
house and workshop where toiling, up- 
ward striving men and women are count- 
ing the treasures of right and justice and 
liberty, which are threatened by our pres- 
ent enemies." 

Q. — Did America formally include 
limitation of armaments as 
part of peace settlements? 

A. — In the address to Congress of Jan- 
uary 22, 1917, the President's statement of 
the armament question was : "There can 
be no sense of safety and equality among 
nations if great preponderating armaments 
are henceforth to continue here and there 
to be built up and maintained. The states- 
men of the world must plan for peace and 
nations must adjust and accojnmodate 
their policy to it as they have planned for 
war and made ready for pitiless contest 
and rivalry. The question of armaments, 
whether on land or sea, is the most im- 
mediately and intensely practical question 
connected with the future fortunes of na- 
tions and of mankind." 

Q. — Do Governments communicate 
with each other through their 
rulers ? 

A. — No. Even though diplomatic notes 
may have been written directly by the 
heads of government, such as the Presi- 
dent of the United States, the Prime Min- 
ister of England, the Premier of France, 
the Chancellor of Germany, etc., the com- 
munications are sent out signed by the 
Secretary of State for the United States, 
the British Secretary of State for For- 
eign Affairs, and the Ministers for For- 
eign Affairs of other nations. They are 



addressed to the chiefs for foreign af- 
fairs and never to the head of a govern- 
ment directly. There have been a few 
rare exceptions during the war. On very 
special occasions that were not essentially 
matters of diplomacy, the King of Eng- 
land, the Premier of France, the Em- 
peror of Germany, etc., have addressed 
the President of the United States di- 
rectly during the war. 

Q. — How were our diplomatic 
communications to belligerent 
Governments signed? 

A. — They were signed "Bryan," and 
later "Lansing," in conformance with the 
international usage just described. AH 
such communications are signed simply 
with the last name of the official in charge. 

Q. — Did the President draft the 
communications that bore the 
signature of his secretaries of 
state? 

A. — It is well known that not only did 
the^ President himself guide the foreign 
policies, _ and not only did the notes ex- 
press his own views and decisions, but 
'that many were written by him personally. 

Q. — Who was Secretary of State 
when the European war be- 
gan? 

A. — William J. Bryan. He resigned on 
June 8, 1915, which was 1 year and 1 
month (less a few days) after the Eu- 
ropean war had begun. 

Q. — Was Bryan's successor Lan- 
sing appointed from private 
life? 

.A. — Robert LansThg was promoted from 
his office as Counselor for the Depart- 
ment of State, with which he had been 
connected in many varying capacities for 
about 22 years. His appointment was ad 
interim to June 23, 1915, on which date 
he was appointed formally and fully as 
Secretary of State. 

Q. — Had a mercantile shipbuilding 
programme been planned be- 
fore the war? 

A. — Yes. Early in the course of the 
war, while it still was confined to Europe, 



22 



Questions and Answers 



a bill was introduced in Congress to pro- 
vide for a system under which the gov- 
ernment could undertake the work of con- 
structing a mercantile marine, and put the 
ships into active service, with a provision 
for withdrawing and letting private capi- 
tal conduct the work under proper safe- 
guards and control after the conditions be- 
came such that government financing and 
operation no longer were necessary. The 
bill was defeated and a second bill with 
some changes met the same fate. 



Q. — What naval plans did we have 
before war? 

A. — The full naval construction pro- 
gramme developed in 1915 was for a 
definite 5-year programme that should 
provide for a continuous construction 
schedule instead of building only from 
year to year. Under this programme, 
there were to be built or building by 
1921 a navy of 27 first-line battleships 
(equal to foreign super-dreadnaughts), 
6 battle-cruisers, 25 second-line battleships 
(dreadnaught types), 10 armored cruisers, 
13 scout cruisers, 5 first-class cruisers 
(maximum swiftness, armoring and gun- 
ning), 3 second-class cruisers, 10 third- 
class cruisers, 108 destroyers, 18 fleet sub- 
marines (sea-going to accompany battle- 
fleets), 157 coast submarines, 6 monitors 
(coast-defense vessels), 20 gunboats (river 
work, station duty, etc.), 4 supply ships. 
15 fuel ships, 4 transports, 3 tenders to 
torpedo vessels, 8 vessels of special types 
and 2 ammunition ships. 



Q. — Was a large army proposed 
before war threatened? 

A. — On November 4, 1915, an Adminis- 
tration programme for a large army es- 
tablishment was made public through an 
address made by the President in the 
Manhattan Club, New York City. As de- 
scribed in detail, it contemplated only 
such an increase in the regular army as 
was necessary for the increased tasks laid 
on it by Hawaii, Porto Rico, the Philip- 
pines and the Texan border. The pro- 
gramme for a larger army was to call for 
training in the following three years of 
400,000 citizen soldiers' to be raised in an- 
nual contingents of 133,000. They were 
to be asked to enlist for three years with 
the colors and three years on furlough ; 
but during their enlistment with the col- 
ors they were not to be organized as a 
standing force, but would be expected 
merely to undergo intensive training for 



a brief period each year. The National 
Guard was to be used as part of the in- 
strumentality to provide this training, and 
it was to have enlarged financial sup- 
port from the Federal Government and a 
more definite connection with the mili- 
tary organization of the whole nation. 

Q. — Did Mexico propose a method 
for terminating the war after 
we joined it? 

A. — Not after we entered, but after 
we had severed diplomatic relations with 
Gerrhany. President Carranza sent a note 
to Washington, dated "Queretaro, Feb- 
ruary 11, 1917," suggesting that the war- 
ring nations be invited to bring the war to 
an end either by their own efforts or by 
availing themselves of the friendly media- 
tion of neutrals, and proposing that if 
peace were not restored within a reason- 
able time, all neutrals refuse any kind of 
implements to the belligerents and suspend 
commercial relations with the warring na- 
tions. 

Q. — What was the reply of the 
United States? 

A. — Under date of March 16, 1917, the 
United States replied, referring to the 
American peace efforts made a few 
months before, and saying: "Of the futile 
results of the President's efforts at that 
time General Carranza is no doubt aware. 
Instead of the conflict being resolved into 
a discussion of terms of peace, the strug- 
gle, both on land and sea, has been re- 
newed with intensified vigor and bitter- 
ness. To such an extent has one group 
of belligerents carried warfare on the 
high seas involving the destruction of 
American ships and the lives of American 
citizens, in contravention of the pledges 
heretofore solemnly given the Government 
of the United States, that it was deemed 
necessary within the past few weeks to 
sever_ relations with one of the Govern- 
ments of the Allied Central Powers." 

Q. — Did we refuse to consider the 
Mexican proposal? 

A. — Yes. The American reply said : "To 
render the situation still more acute, the 
Government of the United States has un- 
earthed a plot laid by the Government 
dominating the Central Powers to embroil 
not only the Government and people of 
Mexico, but also the Government and 
people of Japan, in war with the United 






America's Principles for World-Settlement 



23 



States. At the time this plot was con- 
ceived, the United States was at peace 
with the Government and people of the 
German Empire, and German officials and 
German subjects were not only enjoying 
but abusing the liberties and privileges 
freely accorded to them on American soil 
and under American protection. In these 
circumstances, all of which were in ex- 
istence when the note under acknowledg- 
ment was received, the Government of 
the United States finds itself, greatly to 
its regret and contrary to its desires, in 
a position which precludes it from par- 
ticipating at the present time in the pro- 
posal of General Carranza that the neu- 
tral governments jointly extend an invi- 
tation to the belligerent governments 
countries to bring the war to an end." 
The proposal to cut off supplies was dis- 
missed as being contrary to international 
law. 

Q. — Did we intimate that further 
proposals would not be accept- 
able? 

A. — No. The note was careful to state 
in its concluding passagg : "The President 
would not be understood, however, as de- 
siring to impede the progress of a move- 
ment leading to the resumption of peace- 
ful relations between all the belligerents, 
and would not, therefore, wish the Mex- 
ican Government to feel that his inability 
to act in the present stage of affairs 
should in any way militate against the 
attainment of the high ideals of General 
Carranza by the co-operation of other 
neutral governments in the use of their 
good offices and friendly mediation to 
bring about the end of the terrible war 
which is being waged between the great 
powers of Europe." 

Q. — What part did Mexico take in 
the war after the United States 
entered it? 

A. — None at all. The Mexican Govern- 
ment declared that it proposed to observe 
strict neutrality. It was still in that posi- 
sition in August, 1918, when the European 
War had entered its fifth year. 



Q. — What is neutrality? 

A. — Neutrality is in simple language 
impartiality maintained by a nation during 
disputes or strife between other nations. 
In the meaning of international law this 
impartiality needs to be exercised only 



by the government officially. The citizens 
of a neutral country may express their 
opinions and sympathies, and the neutral 
nation cannot be held accountable, so long 
as the private citizens remain within their 
private rights and do nothing that should 
properly compel their government to take 
cognizance of them. 

Q. — What is forbidden to a neutral 
nation's government? 

A. — The neutral government may not 
express officially an opinion as to the jus- 
tice of either side in a war. It may not 
extend to either side any privilege that 
it does not extend to the other. It must 
rigidly apply all laws and rulings equally 
to both belligerents. It must give each 
exactly the same rfghts, and what it de- 
nies it must deny equally to both. It 
may not permit its territory to be used 
as a military or naval base. It may not 
permit transport of belligerent military 
forces across its territory. 

Q. — What is forbidden to a neutral 
nation's citizens? 

A. — -They may not within the territory 
or jurisdiction of the neutral government 
accept military or naval commissions to 
serve a belligerent or enlist in service or 
hire anybody else to do so. They may 
not hire anybody to go beyond the limit 
or jurisdiction of the neutral nation to 
enlist. They may not fit out and arm any 
vessel in any way to be employed by 
either belligerent and they may not aug- 
ment, or aid in augmenting, the force of 
any ship of war of a belligerent within 
the waters of the neutral country, by add- 
iqg^ to the number of guns, increasing 
their caliber or otherwise adding any 
equipment of war. _ They may not set on 
foot, or aid in setting on foot, any mili- 
tary enterprise to be carried on against 
any of the belligerents from the territory 
or jurisdiction of the neutral country. 

Q. — How much refitting may a bel- 
ligerent warship do in neutral 
waters ? 

A. — A belligerent vessel may not take 
on any warlike equipment at all in neu- 
tral waters. She may refit only to the 
extent of making her fit to continue her 
voyage, and then only to the utmost limit 
of actual necessity. If she needs repairs 
she may remain in the neutral harbor only 
for a sharply limited period and she may 



24 



Questions and Answers 



not exceed the work of repairing to make 
it a work of refitting her beyond the ac- 
tual necessity of repairs. She may take 
on only enough supplies and coal to enable 
her to reach the nearest port of her own 
country. 

Q. — What is the rule if a bellig- 
erent warship enters a neutral 
harbor where there are ships of 
the other belligerent? 

A. — The neutral nation is expected to 
see that the ship of one belligerent 
(whether it be merchant vessel or war- 
ship) shall leave twenty- four hours be- 
fore the other belligerent is permrtted to 
sail. 

Q. — Does international law permit 
citizens of a neutral country to 
manufacture and sell munitions 
of war to belligerents? 

A.— Absolutely. It is a right universally 
recognized and established. 

Q. — May they ship them out of the 
country ? 

A. — The right to sell carries with it, as 
a matter of course, the right to ship. _ But 
the right to ship ceases at the limit of 
jurisdiction of the neutral country. The 
moment they pass that jurisdiction, the 
other belligerent may seize the munitions 
if he can. The principle is thus declared 
in the American neutrality proclamation : 
"While all persons may lawfully and with- 
out restriction manufacture and se^U within 
the United States arms and munitions of 
war, and other articles known as contra- 
band of war, yet they may not carry such 
articles on the high seas for the use of 
any belligerent, nor can they transport 
soldiers of a belligerent or attempt to 
break any blockade which may be lawfully 
established and maintained, without in- 
curring the risk of hostile capture and the 
penalties denounced by the law of nations 
in that behalf." 

Q. — May a neutral Government 
supply a belligerent with muni- 
tions ? 

A. — No. Such an act, officially per- 
formed, would be an act of war. There 
is a decided distinction in this regard be- 
tween a government of a nation and the 
private citizen of a nation. 



Q. — What is benevolent neutral- 
ity? 

A. — It is not genuine neutrality, and, 
in fact, acts of "benevolent neutrality" 
could rarely stand a searching examina- 
tion under application of impartial inter- 
national law. Nations have often exer- 
cised this So-called benevolent neutrality, 
but the non-favored belligerent failed to 
protest only if he was so weak that he 
dared not object or retaliate. A nation 
attempting to exercise "benevolent neu- 
trality" against one of two powerful bel- 
ligerents takes the imminent risk of being 
made a party to the war and being at- 
tacked by the non-favored belligerent. 



Q. — Did the Government ask the 
American people to abstain 
from passionate utterances of 
opinion during the war? 

A. — Yes ; but it was done as an appeal, 
and not as a ruling of law, or with any 
suggestion that any law governed it. ^ It 
was an appeal by the President, which 
the Senate ordered printed August 19, 
1914. Referring to the many varying 
racial strains in American citizenship, the 
appeal said : "Some will wish one nation, 
others another, to succeed in the moment- 
ous struggle. It will be easy to excite 
passion and difficult to allay it. Those 
responsible for exciting it will assume a 
heavy responsibility, responsibility for no 
less a thing than that the people of the 
United States, whose love of their country 
and whose loyalty to its government 
should unite them as Americans all, bound 
in honor and affection to think first of 
her and her interests, may be divided in 
camps of hostile opinion, hot against each 
other, involved in the war itself in im- 
pulse and opinion if not in action. . . . 
I venture, therefore, my fellow country- 
men, to speak a solemn word of warning 
to you against that deepest, most subtle, 
most essential breach of neutrality which 
may spring out of partisanship, out of 
passionately taking sides. The United 
States must be impartial in fact as well 
as in name during these days that are to 
try men's souls." 

Q.— -May merchant vessels carry 
supplies to warships out of 
neutral ports? 

A. — No. That is defined as making the 
neutral port in effect a base for the bel- 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



25 



Hgerent so supplied. The United States 
Government ordered its officials in March, 
1915, to withhold clearance papers from 
any vessel, American or otherwise, which 
was suspected on reasonable cause of in- 
tending to deliver fuel, arms, ammunition, 
men or supplies to any warship of a bel- 
ligerent nation. The penalty for trying to 
leave port without clearance was fixed at 
a fine of not less than $2,000 or more than 
$10,000 or imprisonment not to exceed two 
years, or both fine and imprisonment, with 
the forfeiture of the offending vessel. 



Q. — What methods were used by 
German agents to clear ships 
illegally? 

A. — False manifests — that is, papers 
stating false ports of destination, etc. 
High officials of the Hamburg-American 
line, among them Dr. Buenz, managing di- 
rector, George Koetter, superintending en- 
gineer, Adolph Hachmeister, purchasing 
agent, and Joseph Pappinghaus were in- 
dicted in New York for conspiracy to de- 
fraud the United States and confessed 
that they had sent out twelve ships, proved 
by the Government to have fraudulent 
papers. All had been captured and in- 
terned before reaching their destination. 
Nine of the vessels were chartered, and 
the Hamburg-American Line paid the 
owners for their losses about $1,400,000. 
Captain Boy-Ed's account at a New York 
bank indicated that he had large sums 
for conducting Germany's naval opera- 
tions from the United States, and that he 
reimbursed the Hamburg-American Line 
for this and other expenditures to an 
amount over $2,000,000. Buenz, Koetter 
and Hachmeister were sentenced in De- 
cember, 1915, to 18 months in the Federal 
Penitentiary at Atlanta. Pappinghaus 
was sentenced to a year and a day. Sim- 
ilar means were used on the Pacific coast. 
Besides the men mentioned, more than 15 
firms and individuals have been convicted. 



Q. — How long did the German ship 
"Prinz Eitel Friedrich" hold 
the seas? 

A. — She held the seas from the outbreak 
of hostilities until March 10, 1915, when 
she ran the cordon of Allied warships off 
the Chesapeake Bay and entered Hamp- 
ton Roads. She had started from, China, 
and during her cruise of seven months 
had captured a great many ships. She 
brought many captured crews of merchant 



vessels into port with her. The Prim 
Eitel Friedrich was a passenger ship and 
was commissioned as a warship when war 
began. 

Q. — Did the United States give her 
asylum? 

A. — The United States gave her com- 
mander the safe refuge incumbent on neu- 
tral nations, and ordered naval experts 
to examine her and report on the length 
of time she might need for repairs. On 
March 18, 1915, the Navy Department 
found that she needed 14 days to make 
herself seaworthy enough to leave, and 
gave her until April 6 with an additional 
grace of 24 hours, or until midnight April 
7. Before the expiration of that date, the 
ship appeared many times to be preparing 
to sail, and there was great interest in 
the news, because the Allied cordon had 
been heavily increased. However, in the 
end the vessel elected to remain and ac- 
cept internment. 



Q. — Did any regular German war- 
ships seek Hampton Roads for 
refuge? 

A. — A month after the Prinz Eitel 
Friedrich had entered, the regular cruiser 
Kronprinz Wilhelm made harbor after 8 
months of cruising and very extensive 
captures and destructions of Allied mer- 
chant tonnage. She landed 61 members 
of captured merchant crews at Newport 
News, having transferred the rest at sea 
to captured prizes which she had sent into 
various ports. The American Govern- 
ment gave her from April 11 (the day 
she arrived) until April 30 to make re- 
pairs and leave. She was in much worse 
condition than the Prinz Eitel Friedrich, 
and there was, as a matter of fact, slight 
expectation that she^ would elect to run 
the enemy cordon, since the attempt was 
almost hopeless. She was interned at the 
end of the period of grace. 



Q. — What was the status of the 
"Geier"? 

A.— The Geier was a German gunboat 
cruising in_ the Pacific when war began. 
After holding the sea for some months, 
she entered Honolulu Harbor in October 
with her boilers and tubing in bad con- 
dition. A reasonable time was granted 
to make repairs, and this time was ex- 
tended as the work progressed. During 
its continuation, a Japanese warship 



26 



Questions and Answers 



appeared outside of the harbor and waited 
for the Geier to come out. A German 
merchant vessel, Locksun, also had made 
Honolulu Harbor with the Geier. On 
November 8, 1914, both vessels were in- 
terned, the Geier in regular course as a 
warship that could not leave the neutral 
harbor within a reasonable time, and the 
Locksun as being her tender, which she 
clearly was. During their stay, the Brit- 
ish Ambassador made strong representa- 
tions in Washington asking for immedi- 
ate internment and the German Ambas- 
sador made equally strong protests against 
internment. The United States Govern- 
ment favored neither side and fairly ful- 
filled its duties as a neutral. 



Q. — Did the Germans violate the 
terms of internment? 

A. — The German officers pledged their 
word of honor to our Government not to 
escape from our jurisdiction, and ac- 
cordingly were allowed every liberty. 
After some weeks, several officers of the 
Kronprinz Wilhelm purchased a yacht 
ostensibly for pleasure cruises, secretly 
stocked it with supplies and one night 
sailed away. They obtained the necessary 
funds for escape from the German Consul 
at Richmond, and Captain Boy-Ed filed 
a message at Sayville, asking Berlin for 
instructions for these officers. Paroled 
German officers at San Francisco and 
Guam also violated their oaths. 

Q. — Is it permissible to change 
merchant vessels into war- 
ships ? 

A. — Yes. It is an unquestioned and 
universally practiced right of nations to 
convert merchant vessels carrying their 
flag into warships in their own ports at 
any time, whether in war or peace. There 
is not such unanimity of opinion as to 
the right to convert merchant ships into 
warships on the high seas. At the Sec- 
ond Hague Conference and at the Lon- 
don Naval Conference, Germany, Aus- 
tria-Hungary, France and Russia upheld 
the right of nations to convert on the high 
seas. Great Britain and Belgium opposed 
it at the Hague Conference. Subse- 
quently, at the London Conference, Bel- 
gium not participating, Great Britain 
maintained that attitude. It does not ap- 
pear that any general practice has pre- 
vailed among nations to form a prece- 
dent. The question was left open by the 
nations at the two conferences. 



Q. — Why was the prize ship 
"Farn" made a test case? 

A. — This was a British merchant ship 
captured off Brazil by the German cruiser 
Karlsruhe on October 5, 1914. On Jan- 
uary 12, 1915, she entered the port of 
San Juan, Porto Rico flying the German 
flag, and manned by a German prize 
crew, under the name K. D. 3. The 
British Government claimed that she was 
merely a prize, and that under this defi- 
nition it was the duty of the United States 
to release her to her original British 
owners. The United States held that the 
ship clearly had been used as a tender to 
German warships between October 5 and 
January 12, that this was proper use of a 
prize, and that the prize thereby became 
stamped with the character of its service 
— in other words, that the Farn, having 
been converted by service into a tender or 
auxiliary, ceased to be a mere private 
prize and became a warship auxiliary. 
Under this ruling the K. D. 3 was in- 
terned, under the rules applicable to 
warships. 

Q. — Are hydroaeroplanes consid- 
ered as war vessels in interna- 
tional law? 

A. — There were no hydroaeroplanes at 
the time of the Second Hague Confer- 
ence, 1907, and therefore there is no es- 
tablished and definite statement of inter- 
national law or agreement. When 
America began shipping these airboats to 
Great Britain and France, the German 
Ambassador held that they were not arti- 
cles that a neutral nation could ship. His 
contention was that they really came un- 
der the definition "war vessels" which it 
was undeniably un-neutral to build or 
turn over to a belligerent during war. 
The United States Government held the 
view that they were aircraft, and nothing 
else, despite the fact that they could 
alight on, and rise from, the sea. The 
German Government did not pursue the 
subject and the United States continued 
to sell and ship. 

Q. — Is a presidential proclamation 
a law? 

A. — Not necessarily. As a rule, any 
desires expressed by a presidential procla- 
mation enjoy the respect accorded to a 
law by the American people, but it does 
not follow that this would hold under 
all circumstances. Usually, to be sure, 
a presidential proclamation follows an 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



27 



enabling statute passed by Congress, and 
the proclamation simply announces it to 
the people and explains the methods by 
which it will be put into effect and the 
penalties that follow its violation. How- 
ever, a proclamation may not be a law 
at all. An instance of this is the procla- 
mation against lynching and other deeds 
of violence which the President issued 
July 26, 1918. No new law had been 
passed to punish lynching, and under ex- 
isting laws the Federal Government was, 
as a matter of fact, practically helpless 
to punish such crimes, which came within 
the police power of the individual States. 
This proclamation, therefore, depended on 
the moral effect produced by it. 

Q. — Is an executive order a law? 

A. — Not in the sense of a law passed 
by the legislative branch of the Federal 
Government. An executive order is man- 
datory, being a very real order to the 
various Departments and employees of 
the Government, which they may disobey 
only at their peril ; but it need not be 
based on any specific law passed by Con- 
gress. So long as it does not violate 
any law passed by Congress, an execu- 
tive order may cover anything and intro- 
duce quite new and unexpected methods. 
It is largely a matter of the President's 
personal prerogative. Executive orders 
have played an important part in many 
of the great political struggles in Wash- 
ington. Thus, the big battles over Civil 
Service Reform, which lasted through 
many Administrations, were fought in 
good part by the issuance of executive 
orders that in turn helped or hampered 
reform, according to the forces in con- 
trol at the time. 

Q. — Did the Pope propose peace 
after we joined the war? 

A. — Yes. A few months after we 
joined the war (August 1, 1917), Pope 
Benedict XV interceded with the war- 
ring nations to make peace, and he sug- 
gested as bases for a universal and last- 
ing peace the limitation of armaments, 
international arbitration, and freedom of 
the seas. He proposed that all nations 
renounce^ indemnities and that all occu- 
pied territory be yielded. The territorial 
claims of conflicting nationalities were to 
be left to conciliatory adjustments. 

Q. — Did the Allied answer to the 
Pope's note agree with ours? 
A. — The Allied Governments practic- 



ally left it to the United States to act as 
spokesman, and thus the American an- 
swer stood in effect as the unanimous 
reply of all the nations fighting the Cen- 
tral Powers. The American answer was 
dated August 27, 1917. 

Q. — Did our reply refuse negotia- 
tions for peace? 

A. — Our reply pointed out that the 
Pope in substance proposed a return to 
the status quo ante bellum (the condition 
as it was before war) after which there 
was to be a general condonation, dis- 
armament and a concert of nations based 
on the principle of arbitration. The 
American argument was that no part of 
the great peace program could be car- 
ried out satisfactorily unless the restitu- 
tion of the status quo ante furnished a 
firm and satisfactory base for it, and the 
statement was made that the object of 
this war "is to deliver the free peoples of 
the world from the menace and the actual 
power of a vast military establishment 
controlled by an irresponsible govern- 
ment." 

Q. — Did the American reply to the 
Pope state definite war aims ? 

A. — It stated certain very definite prin- 
ciples. It stated that "no peace can rest 
securely upon political or economic re- 
strictions meant to benefit some nations 
and cripple or embarrass others, upon 
vindictive action of any sort or any kind 
of revenge or deliberate injury. . . . We 
believe that the intolerable wrongs done 
in this war by the furious and brutal 
power of the Imperial German Govern- 
ment ought to be repaired, but not at the 
expense of the sovereignty of any peo- 
ple — rather a vindication of the sover- 
eignty both of those that are weak and 
of those that are strong. Punitive dam- 
ages, the dismemberment of empires, the 
establishment of selfish and exclusive 
economic leagues we deem inexpedient 
and in the end worse than futile, no 
proper basis for a peace of any kind, 
least of all for an enduring peace." 

Q. — Did the American reply offer 
a test for peace plans? 

A.— Yes. The note said: "The test 
of every plan of peace is this : Is it 
based upon the faith of all the peoples 
involved, or merely upon the word of an 
ambitious and intriguing government on 
the one hand, and of a group of free 



Questions and Answers 



peoples on the other? This is a test 
which goes to the root of the matter; 
and it is the test which must be applied." 

Q. — What did the President say 
about dealing with the German 
Government? 

A. — He said: "We cannot take the 
word of the present rulers of Germany 
as a guarantee of anything that is to en- 
dure, unless explicitly supported by such 
conclusive evidence of the will and 
purpose of the German people themselves 
as the other peoples of the world would 
be justified in accepting. Without such 
guarantees, treaties of settlement, agree- 
ments for disarmament, covenants to set 
up arbitration in the place of force, ter- 
ritorial adjustments, reconstitution of 
small nations, if made with the German 
Government, no man, no nation could 
now depend on. We must await some 
new evidence of the purpose of the great 
people of the Central Powers." 



Q. — What does "status quo ante" 
mean? 

A. — It means the status or condition 
that was in force before a given time. 
Used in relation to this war, it means 
the exact status before the war — in 
other words, a peace formed on the basis 
of status quo ante would exactly re- 
create the conditions that existed before 
July 28, 1914, the day when the first 
declaration of war was issued. 



Q. — What is the American attitude 
toward the status quo ante? 

A. — Inan official message delivered to 
the Russian people two months after the 
revolution which dethroned the Czar (de- 
livered to the Provisional Government of 
Russia May 26, 1917), the statement was 
made: "Of course, the Imperial Govern- 
ment and those whom it is using for their 
own undoing, are seeking to obtain 
pledges that the war will end in the 
restoration of the status quo ante. It 
was the status quo ante out of which 
this iniquitous war issued forth, the 
power of the Imperial German Govern- 
ment within the Empire and its wide- 
spread domination and influence outside 
of that_ Empire. That status must be 
altered in such fashion as to prevent any 
such hideous thing from ever happening 
again." 



Q. — What was said about readjust- 
ments in the Russian message? 

A. — The words were: "We are fight- 
ing for the liberty, the self-government, 
and the undictated development of all 
peoples, and every feature of the settle- 
ment that concludes this war must be 
conceived and executed for that pur- 
pose. Wrongs must first be righted, and 
then adequate safeguards must be created 
to prevent their being committed again. 
We ought not to consider remedies 
merely because they have a pleasing and 
sonorous sound. Practical questions can 
be settled only by practical means. 
Phrases will not accomplish the result. 
Effective readjustments will; and what- 
ever readjustments are necessary must be 
made." 



Q. — Was the principle of these 
readjustments laid down? 

A. — The message repeated that "no 
people must be forced under sovereignty 
under which it does not wish to live. No 
territory must change hands except for 
the purpose of securing those who in- 
habit it a fair chance of life and liberty. 
No indemnities must be insisted on ex- 
cept those that constitute payments for 
manifest wrongs done. No readjustments 
of power must be made except such as 
will tend to secure the future peace of 
the world and the future welfare and 
happiness of its peoples." 

Q. — Have definite war aims ever 
been laid officially before Con- 
gress? 

A. — In an Address to Congress Jan- 
uary 8, 1918, the President dealt with the 
Brest-Litovsk negotiations between the 
Central Empires and the Russian Soviet 
or Bolsheviki Government. In this ad- 
dress, a number of very definite objects 
(chief among them a certain set of prin- 
ciples that became noted as the "fourteen 
articles of peace") were formally and 
officially laid before the Senators and 
Representatives of the people of the 
United States. 

This Address followed closely the an- 
nual Message to Congress (delivered 
December 4, 1917) which also had dis- 
cussed the terms for a just and generous 
peace, while at the same time asking 
Congress to declare the United States at 
war with Austria-Hungary. 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



29 



Q. — How did Congress vote on the 
principles laid down? 

A. — Presidential addresses and Mes- 
sages to Congress are not subject to a 
vote. They are merely delivered to Con- 
gress (either in writing, as was the rule 
in the past, or in person, as has been the 
rule in the Wilson administration) and 
Congress receives _ them, but need not 
indicate its sentiment toward them 
unless it choose to do so. 



Q. — Must the President send mes- 
sages to Congress? 

A. — The Constitution of the United 
States makes it mandatory in Section III, 
Article II which provides that the Presi- 
dent "shall from time to time give to the 
Congress information of the state of the 
Union, and recommend to their consid- 
eration such measures as he shall judge 
necessary and expedient." 



been passed over by Congresses without 
any action. Usually, however, a Presi- 
dential recommendation is followed by 
the introduction of bills (laws). These 
bills may be drafted in close compliance 
with the Presidential recommendations, 
but not necessarily so. Congress action 
on Presidential recommendations depends 
largely on the degree of power and in- 
fluence with the public, or with Congress, 
or with both that a given President may 
enjoy. In recent years, and especially 
since the European War began, there has 
been a great increase in so-called "Ad- 
ministration bills" — that is, bills drafted 
in absolute compliance with Presidential 
recommendations. They are drafted 
either by members of Congress who are 
in dose agreement with Administrative 
desires, or they are drafted directly with- 
in the Executive "family" — the heads of 
the Departments. 



Q. — Can the heads of departments 
introduce such bills? 



Q. — May he deliver as many mes- 
sages as he may please? 

A. — He may deliver Messages or Ad- 
dresses to Congress as often as he may 
choose. As a matter of policy, however, 
our Presidents refrain from exercising 
the right too often, because over-use 
would tend to weaken the importance of 
them, and would lessen the public inter- 
est in these utterances from the executive 
head of the government. 



A— No. The Cabinet officers have no 
seat in Congress. None of them may 
even appear before Congress without in- 
vitation or demand by Congress, except 
the President himself. An Administra- 
tion _ bill, even though drafted by a 
President himself, can be introduced only 
by a Member of Congress. Thus, even 
the Declaration of War on Austria- 
Hungary, for which the President asked 
in the annual Message, had to be intro- 
duced in the form of a resolution pro- 
posed by members of Congress. 



Q._What does "State of the 
Union" mean? 



Q. — Could Congress oppose Presi- 
dential recommendations ? 



A. — It means anything that a President 
may deem important to the people of 
the United States. In a narrower sense, 
it means also that a Presidential Mes- 
sage usually carries a statement of 
finances, the state of commerce and of 
expenditures and needs of the various 
administrative and executive Depart- 
ments of the Government. 



Q. — Must Congress act on recom- 
mendations in Presidential 
messages? 

A. — It is not mandatory on < Congress 
to do so. Many recommendations have 



A. — Yes. A Congress has the legal 
power to enact laws that run directly 
counter to a Presidential recommenda- 
tion. _ To do so would demand simply a 
sufficient _ majority in opposition. Since 
an American President has the power to 
veto Congress bills, political exigencies 
demand not merely a majority sufficient 
to pass a bill, but the still greater ma- 
jority (two-thirds of the House and the 
Senate) necessary under the Constitution 
to re-pass a bill over a Presidential veto. 
It has often occurred, however, that a 
President has found himself in a political 
situation where he found it expedient not 
to exercise his power of veto, and to 
allow a bill to become a law even though 
it was contrary to his wishes. 



3Q 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — In what other ways could Con- 
gress disapprove Presidential 
recommendations ? 

A. — Congress could pass resolutions 
that might range from specific and direct 
disapproval to expressions more or less 
guarded that would put the legislative 
body on record as being in opposition to 
the executive views and desires. With- 
out passing any resolutions at all, Con- 
gress could open a debate (based, per- 
haps, on subjects not apparently touch- 
ing the subject matter of a Presidential 
Message) and in the course of this debate 
the speeches on the floor might express 
to the people of the United States the 
fact that the Congress is antagonistic. 

Q. — What was the attitude of Con- 
gress toward the "fourteen 
articles"? 

A. — Speeches, resolutions, and the 
general tenor of Congress action on suc- 
ceeding war legislation desired or recom- 
mended by the Administration indicated 
that Congress, as representing the peo- 
ple of the United States, received them 
with large approval. Where there were 
differences of opinion (mostly on the 
part of individual members of Congress) 
they were differences mainly as to spe- 
cific details and not to the principles. It 
seems perfectly correct and safe to say 
that had a vote been necessary on Presi- 
dential Messages, this particular one 
would have been approved by a big ma- 
jority, and probably unanimously. 

Q. — Was the famous statement 
about secret diplomacy in 
these fourteen articles? 

A. — It led all the others, being the first 
article. As stated in a previous question 
and answer (see some pages preceding 
this) its full wording was : "i. Open 
covenants of peace, openly arrived at ; 
after which there shall be no private 
international understandings of any 
kind, but diplomacy shall proceed always 
frankly and in the public view." 

Q. — Does our Constitution permit 
secret diplomacy? 

A. — It does not interdict secret diplo- 
matic negotiations, but the spirit of the 
Constitution is against them, and in one 



most important aspect the Constitution 
distinctly and positively prohibits secret 
entanglements. This prohibition is in 
Paragraph 2, Section II, Article II, 
which declares that the President "shall 
have power, by and with the advice and 
consent of the Senate, to make treaties, 
provided two-thirds of the Senators pres- 
ent concur." 

Q. — What does "by and with, the 
advice and consent" of the 
Senate mean? 

A. — There has been much discussion at 
different times in our history whether 
this means that the Senate has the power 
to enter into even the preliminary nego- 
tiations toward a treaty, or whether the 
Senate's right to "advise and consent" 
begins only when a completed treaty is 
laid before it. To the non-hair-splitting 
mind, it has always appeared that the 
right to "advise" carries with it the right 
to be informed from the beginning. In 
actual practice, the Senate's power to 
reject a treaty absolutely naturally obliges 
the diplomatic service to exercise great 
care to make none that shall fail to meet 
public approval. 

Q. — Could not the Senate approve 
a treaty in secret session? 

A. — Yes. But here again the American 
practice forbids. The Senate may, and 
often does, discuss a treaty in "executive 
session" which is secret. But the final 
vote on such a treaty (and, indeed, usu- 
ally, a final debate on treaties) is made 
public, and the treaty itself is published. 

Q. — Does the Constitution permit 
secret Congress debates? 

A. — Each House may determine its 
own rules for procedure, under a clause 
permitting this. As a matter of fact, of 
course, each Congress adheres to the 
established rules of procedure in the larpe 
sense. However, paragraph 3, Section V, 
Article I, says : "Each House shall keep 
a journal of its proceedings and from 
time to time publish the same, except- 
ing such parts as may in their judgment 
require secrecy." 

Q. — What was the second article in 
the famous fourteen? 

A. — "Absolute freedom of navigation 
upon the seas, outside territorial waters, 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



31 



alike in peace and in war, except as the 
seas may be closed in whole or in part by 
international action for the enforcement 
of international covenants." 

Q. — Would free seas make for ab- 
solute freedom of trade? 

A. — Not absolutely. There remain 
many other ways besides blocking the seas 
or destroying sea-borne commerce, _ by 
which one nation or a group of nations 
might throttle the trade of another nation 
or group. The most obvious is in erect- 
ing economic barriers — domestic laws 
hampering foreign shipping, onerous port 
laws, tariff walls and so forth. It is this 
contingency which the third article in the 
peace program covered. 

Q. — What was this third article? 

A. — Its exact wording was: "III. The 
removal, so far as possible, of all eco- 
nomic barriers and the establishment of 
an equality of trade conditions among 
all the nations consenting to the peace 
and associating themselves for its main- 
tenance." 



overpowering the armament of rival na- 
tions or groups. But only the most hope- 
lessly dishonest mind could so mis-read 
or misinterpret the statement as made in 
this Article IV. The position and the 
ideals of the United States have been 
stated so often, so simply and so un- 
equivocally that the honest minds of the 
whole world know that the limitation of 
armament as suggested here is limitation 
to a degree where no nation's armament 
can threaten another. 



Q. — Did the fourteen articles touch 
territorial adjustments? 

A. — Nine of them were devoted to that 
aspect of international settlement. Arti- 
cle V led this part of the program with 
the following statement as to colonies : 
"V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely 
impartial adjustment of all colonial 
claims, based upon a strict observance 
of the principle that in determining all 
such questions of sovereignty the inter- 
ests of the populations concerned must 
have equal weight with the equitable 
claims of the_ Government whose title Ts 
to be determined." 



Q. — Could such freedom of trade 
exist side by side with rival 
war armaments? 

A. — Not very well, and even if it did 
exist for a considerable period, it would 
always be under a precarious tenure. 
Whether it be true or not that trade 
rivalries are at the bottom of most wars, 
it seems equally true in a measure that 
rival armaments sooner or later are 
likely to be used for blocking rival trade. 
The fourth article in the American peace 
program is : "IV. Adequate guarantees 
given and taken that national armaments 
will be reduced to the lowest point con- 
sistent with national safety." 

Q. — Would not militaristic nations 
claim that a huge armament is 
needed for "national safety" ? 

A. — "Defense" has always been the 
strongest argument of jingoes and others 
who at heart wanted a huge armament. 
Perfectly honest and magnanimous men, 
too, have at times been so impressed with 
the ever-present dangers inherent in in- 
ternational rivalries, jealousies and dip- 
lomacies, that they have felt that "de- 
fense" rightly means armament capable of 



Q. — Did one of the articles offer a 
solution of the Russian prob- 
lem? 

_ A. — Article VI laid down not a solu- 
tion but the elements on which the solu- 
tion must rest. It provided for "The 
evacuation of all Russian territory, and 
such a settlement of all questions affect- 
ing Russia as will secure the best and 
freest co-operation of the other nations 
of the world in obtaining for her an 
unhampered and unembarrassed oppor- 
tunity for the independent determination 
of her own political development and 
national policy, and assure her of a sin- 
cere welcome into the society of free 
nations under institutions of her own 
choosing; and, more than a welcome, 
assistance also of every kind that she 
may need and may herself desire." 



Q. — Did we disavow all selfish pur- 
poses regarding Russia? 

A. — Most specifically. The concluding 
paragraph in Article VI said : "The 
treatment accorded Russia by her sister 
nations in the months to come will be 
the acid test of their good will, of their 
comprehension of her needs as distin- 



32 



Questions and Answers 



guished from their own interests, and of 
their intelligent and unselfish sympathy." 

Q. — What principle was laid down 
regarding Belgium? 

A. — Article VII said : "Belgium, , the 
whole world will agree, must be evacu- 
ated and restored without any attempt 
to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys 
in common with all other free nations. 
No other single act will serve as this 
will serve to restore confidence among 
the nations in the laws which they have 
themselves set and determined for the 
government of their relations with one 
another. Without this healing act the 
whole structure and validity of inter- 
national law is forever impaired." 

Q. — Did one of the articles demand 
the restoration of Alsace-Lor- 
raine to France? 

A. — Article VIII dealt with the matter 
' of Alsace-Lorraine and it said that the 
wrong done to France by Prussia "should 
be righted." The exact text of Article 
VIII is : "All French territory should be 
freed and the invaded portions restored ; 
and the wrong done to France by Prussia 
in 1871 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine, 
which has unsettled the peace of the world 
for nearly fifty years, should be righted, 
in order that peace may once more be 
made secure in the interests of all." 



Q. — What was said in the Presi- 
dential address about the Ital- 
ian claims ? 

A. — The Italian territorial question was 
the subject of Article IX, which was: 
"A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy 
should be effected along clearly recog- 
nizable lines of nationality." 

Q. — Are these claims the ones that 
inspire the "Italia Irredenta" 
movement ? 

A. — Very largely. The movement, how- 
ever, also has the impelling force of a 
striving for spiritual unity among the 
Italian races. It must be remembered that 
the present united Italy is of very mod- 
ern creation. For centuries before that, 
Italian dreamers and patriots had longed 
for it vainly, being defeated continually 
by internecine conflicts between various 



Italian States and ruling houses, and by 
constant disruption due to wars with out- 
side nations. 

Q.— What does "Italia Irredenta" 
mean? 

A. — It means "Italy unredeemed" and 
in recent years this has meant the terri- 
tory on the north and the northeast — the 
Trentino and Trieste. Up to 1866 and 
1870 when Venetia and the Papal States 
were won to Italy, the term included those 
territories also, but the real growth of 
the modern Italia Irredenta movement 
came after 1878. 

Q. — How did Austria get posses- 
sion of territory claimed by 
Italy? 

A. — Austria's hold goes back to the in- 
volved wars and intrigues of past cen- 
turies, some of the possessions dating 
back to the days of the Holy Roman 
Empire which itself was an extraordi- 
nary welter of German States and 
Kingdoms, Austrian and Bohemian 
States, Italian and Papal States, with 
the Emperors sometimes very powerful 
and at other times very weak and hold- 
ing their thrones only by grace of the 
lesser Princes or through jealousies that 
prevented combinations against the Em- 
peror. At one time Austria held all of 
Venetia. To the south lay the Papal 
States, stretching along the Adriatic on 
the east and extending across Italy to the 
western coast. Wars with France con- 
tributed to the complications that make 
Italian history a confused one to all but 
close historical students. Through it all, 
however, there remained alive the struggle 
for unity, to be made into fact at last by 
Garibaldi and his fellow revolutionists. 

Austria's signal defeat by Prussia in 
1866 enabled Italy to regain Venetia. In 
1870, when the Franco-Prussian War be- 
gan, Napoleon III had to withdraw the 
French troops from Rome, and the Ital- 
ians entered the city September 20, 1870. 



Q. — Why did Italy join the Triple 
Alliance with Austria as one of 
the three? 

A. — Very largely because after Italy at 
last had achieved a national existence, her 
statesmen felt that the young State was 
too weak against possible enemies. In- 
spired by this feeling, these men, chief 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



33 



among whom was the famous patriot 
Crispi, sought approach to Germany. As 
Crisp! says in his memoirs, Bismarck was 
willing, but he pointed to the fact that 
Germany had friendship with Austria- 
Hungary as a dominating motive, and 
could not draw closer to an Italy harbor- 
ing enmity toward that nation. "The 
way to Berlin lies through Vienna" is one 
of Bismarck's sayings quoted by Crispi. 
The advice was accepted and the triple 
alliance was the result some years later. 

Q.— Did Austria offer to yield 
some of the disputed territory 
to Italy? 

A. — Some time after the war had be- 
gun, and while Italy still was neutral but 
moving fast toward war, Austria-Hun- 
gary offered to cede certain northern 
territory of fairly large extent. The 
condition was made, however, that Aus- 
tria was to hold it until the war ended. 
After considerable negotiation the two 
nations failed to agree, and soon there- 
after Italy declared war. 

Q. — What did the fourteen articles 
say about Austria-Hungary 
and the Balkans? 

A— Article X said : "The peoples of 
Austria-Hungary, whose place among the 
nations we wish to see safeguarded and 
assured, should be accorded the freest 
opportunity of autonomous development." 

Article XI was : "Roumania, Serbia 
and Montenegro should be evacuated ; 
occupied territories restored ; Serbia ac- 
corded free and secure access to the sea; 
and the relations of the several Balkan 
States to one another determined by 
friendly counsel along historically estab- 
lished lines of allegiance and nationality; 
and international guaranties of the politi- 
cal and economic independence and ter- 
ritorial integrity of the several Balkan 
States should be entered into." 

Q. — How many nationalities are 
there in Austria-Hungary? 

A. — There are some eighteen groups 
that lay claim to "nationality." Bohemia 
is overwhelmingly Slav and demands 
recognition as such. Trieste is almost a 
pure Italian city; Trentino is Italian, and 
the townsfolk of Dalmatia are Italians. 
The districts of Carniola and parts of 
Carinthia are Slav. _ Hungary is ruled by 
Magyars, but within its limits are mil- 
lions of Slavs. Croatia is pure Slav. The 



"Hungarian" seaport of Fiume is a pure 
Slav city. 

Q. — Just what are the Slavs? 

A.' — Originally they were, presumably, 
Asiatic, but that is of interest only to the 
ethnologists. The big contemporaneous 
fact is that the Slav races of eastern and 
southeastern Europe, different though 
they be in appearance, thought, manners 
and even speech, constitute a greater 
part of the population of that region, and 
are inspired by a great ambition for ra- 
cial unity. 

Q. — Are the Slavs mixed in with 
other populations? 

A. — They are. It is this fact that has 
made a great deal of the political trouble 
in the past and that will make much in 
the future, unless a most enlightened 
method is found of protecting minorities. 
If the time-honored majority-rule is ac- 
cepted, then there will always be a very 
large population which happens to be in 
the electoral minority, that will be utterly 
dominated by another race which happens 
to have the majority. 

In Austria-Hungary, however, as at 
present constituted, the political arrange- 
ments are such as to allow minorities 
(German and Hungarian) to dominate 
majorities (Czechs, Poles, Ruthenes, 
Slovenes, Dalmatians, Roumanians). 

Q. — What regions in Europe are 
inhabited by Slavs ? 

A. — The Slavs inhabit eastern and 
southeastern Europe, where they are the 
great majority of the population, but they 
are not geographically united. The main 
stock comprises the Russians, Poles, 
Czechs, Slovaks, and Ruthenes or Little 
Russians. In the south, and separated 
from the northern branch by a solid bar- 
rier of Germans, Magyars, and Rouma- 
nians, live the Southern or Jugo-Slavs. 
The Bulgars have usually been included 
in the Southern _ Slavs, but they were 
originally an Asiatic people who have 
been Slavicized. 

Q. — What is Pan-Slavism? 

A. — Spiritually it was an expression of 
deep sentimental and poetical aspiration 
of the Slav races and tribes for spiritual 
unity. About forty years ago it assumed 
political importance, playing a considera- 
ble part in the Balkan rebellions against 
Turkish rule. Since then it has turned 



34 



Questions and Answers 



itself against the domination of Slav ma- 
jorities and minorities everywhere by 
other nationalities. 

Q. — How could Serbia get access to 
the sea? 

A. — In any of three directions : by an 
extension of her territories southeastward 
across Macedonia and so to the ^gean 
Sea somewhere near the Gulf of Saloniki. 
By an extension due westward through 
Bosnia, or by incorporating Bosnia in her 
territory and thus giving her access to 
the Dalmatian Adriatic sea coast. By an 
extension southwestward into what is 
now Albania and thus bringing her out on 
the Adriatic south of Montenegro. 

Q. — How did Austria and Serbia 
come to blows? 

A— On June 28, 1914, the Archduke 
Francis Ferdinand, heir to the Austro- 
Hungarian throne, and his wife, were as- 
sassinated in Sarajevo, the capital of 
Bosnia. The assassin and some of his 
accomplices were taken and the Austro- 
Hungarian government charged that the 
Serbian government was responsible for 
the agitation that had led to the deed 
and that at least some Serbian officials 
had guilty cognizance of the conspiracy 
itself. 

Q. — What was the general origin 
of Serbo-Austrian enmity? 

A. — Pan-Slavism fundamentally ; but 
specifically there had grown a most pow- 
erful feeling of nationalism in Serbia 
after the second Balkan War, when Ser- 
bia had expanded into Macedonia. The 
Pan-Slavic movement thus acquired a 
controlling character of Pan-Serbism — 
that is, from being the large general de- 
mand for the unity of Slavic people, it 
had become a movement for extension of 
Serbian sovereignty over Serbish people. 

It created a Serbian demand for the 
incorporation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, 
with a "window on the Adriatic." 

Q. — Who possessed Bosnia and 
Herzegovina originally? 

A. — Turkey owned them, but there were 
many rebellions against Turkish rule. 
Many of these were, however, not so 
much on national or racial lines as on 
religious lines, being based largely on the 
desire of the Christian populations to free 
themselves from Moslem rule. 

Q. — When did Austria-Hungary 
get the provinces? 
A. — After Russia defeated Turkey in 



the war of 1877-1878. In the settlement 
known as the Congress of Berlin (1878), 
Bosnia and Herzegovina were placed 
under loose Austro-Hungarian control, 
while remaining nominally a Turkish pos- 
session. 

Q. — What caused the first big op- 
position to Austria? 

A. — In 1908 the Imperial Government 
of Austria-Hungary was extended over 
the provinces by decree, thus violating the 
Treaty of Berlin. In other words, Aus- 
tria-Hungary took into her actual pos- 
session the territories that had been 
placed into her care, for more or less 
limited control, thirty years before. Those 
thirty years had seen a great awakening 
of the political sense among all the people 
of Europe, and especially among the 
Slavs, Croatians, Bohemians, and other 
Allied races. Therefore, while in actual- 
ity the change was slight (since Austria 
had been sovereign to all intents and 
purposes), the people's attitude toward it 
was the difference between a Europe of 
1878 and a Europe of 1908. It was the 
new generation of Bosnians and Herze- 
govinians who responded to the stirrings 
of race and political thought. 

Q. — Once we heard continually of 
Macedonia. What part did it 
play as a cause for the war? 

A. — No direct part. Macedonia occu- 
pied world attention because of the strug- 
gle to throw off Turkish domination, and 
this struggle had a chief part in bring- 
ing a union of Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia 
and ^Montenegro against Turkey. The 
war of 1912-1913 followed, and_ Turkey 
lost the greater part of her Balkan ter- 
ritory. The Balkan Allies, however, fell 
out over the division of the conquered 
territory, and particularly over Mace- 
donia. 

"National aspirations" played the 
greatest part in the quarrel. Each of the 
involved nations alleged that its own 
nationals inhabited contested parts of the 
province. Bulgarians declared that Greece 
and Serbia were trying to take parts that 
contained purely Bulgarian population, 
and the second Balkan war began June, 

1913. 

The result of it was that Bulgaria, badly 
defeated by her former allies, lost all of 
the Macedonian territory that she de- 
clared belonged to her by right of nation- 
ality, except for a small strip that gave 
her limited access to the ^Egean Sea. 
Roumania, which had entered the second 
Balkan war against Bulgaria, took from 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



35 



her a strip of territory on the Black Sea — 
the Dobrudja. 

Q. — Did the President's peace pro- 
gram include settlement of 
Turkish questions? 

A. — Yes. Article XII is the one that 
dealt with Turkey. Its wording was: 
"The Turkish portions of the present 
Ottoman Empire should be assured a se- 
cure sovereignty, but the other nationali- 
tTes which are now under Turkish rule 
should be assured an undoubted security 
of life and an unmolested opportunity of 
autonomous development, and the Darda- 
nelles should be permanently opened as a 
free passage to the ships and commerce of 
all nations under international guaran- 
ties." 



Q. — What was the principle in the 
Presidential peace program for 
Poland? 

A. — Article XIII declared : "An inde- 
pendent Polish State should be erected 
which should include the territories in- 
habited by indisputably Polish popula- 
tions, which should be assured a free and 
secure access to the sea, and whose po- 
litical and economic independence and 
territorial integrity should be guaranteed 
by international covenant." 

Q. — In what direction could Poland 
have access to the sea? 

A. — Northward to the Baltic. The an- 
cient Poland extended to that ocean. In 
the sixteenth century Poland still pos- 
sessed a strip of Baltic sea coast between 
Germany and the Provinces of Livonia 
and Courland. If that form of access 
were restored, the new Poland would 
have the present west Prussian port of 
Danzig. Without actual territorial out- 
let on the sea, "access" might be pro- 
vided by establishing free navigation of 
the Vistula River, which empties into the 
Baltic. An extension of territory north- 
eastward through Livonia and Courland 
would give Poland territorial footing on 
the Gulf of Riga. 

Q. — What was the final article of 
the peace program? 

A. — Article XIV called for a league of 
nations in these words : "A general as- 
sociation of nations must be formed, un- 
der specific covenants, for the purpose of 



affording mutual guaranties of political 
independence and territorial integrity to 
great and small States alike." 

Q. — What was the occasion for the 
address of January, 191 8? 

A.— The Central Powers had begun 
negotiation with the Russian delegation 
at Brest-Litovsk, and had pretended that 
they would not prolong the war a single 
day for the sake of conquest, and that 
they were ready for a peace "without 
forcible annexations and indemnities." 
tral Powers did not wish to deprive of 
Count Czernin had stated that the Cen- 
political independence those nations which 
lost it during the war: that the protec- 
tion of minorities constituted an essential 
component part of the constitutional right 
of peoples to self determination; and they 
thought both sides might waive indem- 
nification for both war costs and war 
damage. He added: "It is necessary, 
however, to indicate most clearly that the 
proposals of the Russran delegation could 
be realized only in case all the powers 
participating in the war obligate them- 
selves scrupulously to adhere to the terms 
in common with all peoples." 

Q. — Did the Central Powers carry- 
out their promises at Brest- 
Litovsk? 

A.— No. And the President's Address 
of January 8, 1918, said that it was a 
reasonable conjecture that the suggested 
principles of settlement originated with 
the more liberal statesmen of Germany 
and Austria while the concrete terms of 
actual settlement came "from the military 
leaders who have no thought but to keep 
what they have got." Notwithstanding 
this, he took up their challenge to their 
adversaries to say what sort of settle- 
ment they would deem just and satis- 
factory. 

Q. — Was any reply made to the 
American peace program by 
the Central Powers? 

A.— -The German Chancellor, Von 
Hertling, and Count Czernin of Austria 
replied in speeches which they delivered 
on January 24, 1918. Von Hertling spoke 
in generalities, and maintained that the 
various nations among the Allies must 
negotiate separately, and that each ques- 
tion should be settled with the nation con- 
cerned. It was essentially an appeal to 
the spirit of old-time diplomacy, to the 



36 



Questions and Answers 



methods of the Congress of Vienna and 
similar old peace conferences. Czernin 
spoke more clearly. He agreed to the 
principle of a free Poland and his re- 
marks about Belgium and about national 
aspirations were somewhat encouraging. 

Q. — How did America respond? 

A. — The American response was 
through another Presidential address to 
Congress, delivered February n, 1918. 
The address referred with considerable 
approval to Count Czernin's speech, but 
opposed Von Hertling's remarks and pro- 
posal with the words : "The method the 
German Chancellor proposes is the 
method of the Congress of Vienna. We 
cannot and will not return to that. What 
is at stake now is the peace of the world. 
What we are striving for is a new inter- 
national order based upon broad and uni- 
versal principles of right and justice — 
no more peace of shreds and patches. Is 
it possible that Count Von Hertling does 
not see that, does not grasp it, is in fact 
living in his thought in a world dead and 
gone? Has he utterly forgotten the 
Reichstag resolutions of the 19th of July, 
or does he deliberately ignore them?" 

Q. — What was the gist of the state- 
ment that replied to Count 
Czernin? 

A.— It stated that the United States 
was quite ready to consider evidence that 
the settlements suggested by the Govern- 
ment were not the best or the most en- 
during and that "they are only her own 
provisional sketch of principles and of 
the way in which they should be applied." 
The address continued : "After all, the 
test of whether it is possible for either 
Government to £0 any further in this 
comparison of views is simple and obvi- 
ous. The principles to be applied are 
these : . . ." There followed a statement 
of four principles for testing the possi- 
bility of agreeing on basic and funda- 
mental terms. 

Q. — Did these four principles make 
new demands? 

A. — No. They merely re-stated in a 
large and general way the basic things 
that America felt to be absolutely vital 
to any discussion of a just peace. They 
were: (1) That each part of the final 
settlement must be based upon the essen- 
tial justice of that particular case and 
upon such adjustments as are most likely 
to bring a peace that will be permanent; 
(2) that peoples and provinces are not to 



be bartered about from sovereignty to 
sovereignty as if they were mere chattels 
and pawns in a game, even the great 
game, now forever discredited, of the bal- 
ance of power; but that (3) every terri- 
torial settlement involved in this war must 
be made in the interest and for the bene- 
fit of the populations concerned, and not 
as part of any mere adjustment or com- 
promise of claims amongst rival States ; 
and (4) that all well-defined national as- 
pirations shall be accorded the utmost 
satisfaction that can be accorded them 
without introducing new, or perpetuating 
old, elements of discord and antagonism 
that would be likely in time to break the 
peace of Europe and consequently of the 
world. 

Q. — When did America declare that 
force was the only possible re- 
ply to the Central Powers ? 

A.— On April 6, 1918, through a Presi- 
dential speech in Baltimore, a year after 
war with _ Germany had officially begun. 
By that time the proceedings in Russia, 
Finland, the Ukraine and in Roumania 
had convinced America that the militarist 
factions in the Central Empires proposed 
to exploit victory in the old way, and to 
gather the fruits by force. It was in 
reference to this that the President said: 

"Germany has once more said that 
force, and force alone, shall decide 
whether justice and peace shall reign in 
the affairs of men, whether right as 
America conceives it or dominion as she 
conceives it shall determine the destinies 
of mankind. There is, therefore, but one 
response possible from us : Force, force 
to the utmost, force without stint or limit, 
the righteous and triumphant force which 
shall make right the law of the world and 
cast every selfish dominion down in the 
dust." 

Q. — Did we then declare that we 
would not consider peace? 

A. — No. Though accepting the chal- 
lenge of force, the President said in the 
same speech : 

"What, then are we to do? For my- 
self, I am ready, ready still, ready even 
now, to discuss a fair and just and hon- 
est peace at any time that it is sincerely 
proposed — a peace in which the strong and 
the weak shall fare alike. But the an- 
swer, when I proposed such a peace, came 
from the German commanders in Russia 
and I cannot mistake the meaning of the 
answer." 

Another statement he made was : 

"We have ourselves proposed no injus- 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



37 



tice, no aggression. We are ready, when- 
ever the final reckoning is made, to be 
just to the German people, deal fairly 
with the German power, as with all others. 
There can be no difference between 
peoples in the final judgment, if it is 
indeed to be a righteous judgment. To 
propose anything but justice, even-handed 
and dispassionate justice, to Germany at 
any time, whatever the outcome of the 
war, would be to renounce and dishonor 
our own cause, for we ask nothing that 
we are not willing to accord." 

Q. — What was the first of the final 
peace notes? 

A. — A note dated September 16, 1918, 
from the Austro-Hungarian Government 
proposing a "confidential and non-binding 
discussion." The American reply, made 
promptly on September 17th, was that the 
United States "has repeatedly, and with 
entire candor, stated the terms upon which 
the United States would consider peace, 
and can and will entertain no proposal for 
a conference upon a matter concerning 
which it has made its position and pur- 
poses so plain." 

Q. — When did the German Gov- 
ernment ask for an armistice? 

A.— On October 6, 1918, in a note 
through the Swiss Charge d'Affaires in 
Washington, asking for peace and stating : 

"The German Government accepts, as 
a basis for peace negotiations, the pro- 
gram laid down by the President of the 
United States in his message to Con- 
gress on January 8, 1918, and in his 
subsequent pronouncements, particu- 
larly in his address of September 27, 
1918. 

"In order to avoid further bloodshed 
the German Government requests the 
immediate conclusion of a general ar- 
mistice on land, on water, and in the 
air. 

Q. — What was our reply? 

A. — It was dated October 8, 1918, and 
was: 

"Before making reply to the request 
of the Imperial German Government, 
and in order that that reply shall be as 
candid and straightforward as the mo- 
mentous interests involved require, the 
President of the United States deems 
it necessary to assure himself of the exact 
meaning of the note of the Imperial 
Chancellor. Does the Imperial Chancellor 
mean that the Imperial German Gov- 
ernment accepts the terms laid down by 



the President in his address to the Con- 
gress of the United States on the 8th 
of January last, and in subsequent ad- 
dresses, and that its object in entering 
into discussions would be only to agree 
upon the practical details of their ap- 
plication? 

"The President feels bound to say 
with regard to the suggestion of an 
armistice that he would not feel at 
liberty to propose a cessation of arms 
to the Governments with which the 
Government of the United States is 
associated against the Central Powers 
so long as the armies of those Powers 
are upon their soil. The good faith of 
any discussion would manifestly depend 
upon the consent of the Central Powers 
immediately to withdraw their forces 
everywhere from invaded territory. 

"The President also feels that he is 
justified in asking whether the Impe- 
rial Chancellor is speaking merely for 
the constituted authorities of the Em- 
pire who have so far conducted the war. 
He deems the answers to these ques- 
tions vital from every point of view." 

Q. — How did Germany reply? 

A. — Germany replied on October 12, 
1918. 

"The German Government has ac- 
cepted the terms laid down by Presi- 
dent Wilson, in his address of January 
8, and in his subsequent addresses on 
the foundation of a permanent peace of 
justice. Consequently, its object in en- 
tering into discussion would be only to 
agree upon practical details of the ap- 
plication of these terms. The German 
Government believes that the Govern- 
ment of the powers associated with the 
Government of the United States also 
take the position taken by President 
Wilson in his addresses. 

"The German Government, in ac- 
cordance with the Austro-Hungarian 
Government for the purpose of bring- 
ing about an armistice, declares itself 
ready to comply with the proposition 
of the President in regard to evacua- 
tion. The German Government sug- 
gests that the President may occasion 
the meeting of a mixed commission for 
making the necessary arrangements 
concerning the evacuation. 

"The present German Government 
which has undertaken the responsibil- 
ity for this step towards peace has been 
formed by conferences and in agree- 
ment with the great majority of the 
Reichstag. The Chancellor, supported 
in all his actions by the will of this ma- 



38 



Questions and Answers 



jority, speaks in the name of the Ger- 
man Government and of the German 
people. 

Q. — Was the destruction of arbi- 
trary power demanded in the 
answer to this note? 

A. — Yes. The American note, dated 
October 14, 1918, said: 

"The unqualified acceptance by the 
present German Government and by a 
large majority of the German Reich- 
stag of the terms laid down by the 
President of the United States, in his 
address to the Congress of the United 
States on the 8th of January, 1918, and 
in his subsequent addresses justifies^ the 
President in making a frank and direct 
statement of his decision with regard to 
the communications of the German Gov- 
ernment. 

"It must be clearly understood that 
the process of evacuation and the con- 
ditions of an armistice are matters 
which must be left to the judgment and 
advice of the military advisers of the 
Government of the United States and 
the allied Governments, and the Presi- 
dent feels it his duty to say that no 
arrangement can be accepted by the 
Government of the United States which 
does not provide absolutely satisfac- 
tory safeguards and guarantees of the 
maintenance of the present military su- 
premacy of the armies of the United 
States and of the Allies in the field. He 
feels confident that he can safely as- 
sume that this will also be the judgment 
and decision of the allied governments. 

"The President feels that it is also 
his duty to add that neither the Gov- 
ernment of the United States nor, he is 
quite sure, the Governments with which 
the Government of the United States 
is associated as a belligerent will con- 
sent to consider an armistice so long 
as the armed forces of Germany con- 
tinue the illegal and inhumane practices 
which they still persist in. At the very 
time that the German Government ap- 
proaches the Government of the United 
States with proposals of peace, its sub- 
marines are engaged in sinking passen- 
ger ships at sea, and not the ships 
alone, but the very boats in which their 
passengers and crews seek to make 
their way to safety; and in their present 
enforced withdrawal from Flanders and 
France the German armies are pursuing 
a course of wanton destruction which 
has always been regarded as in direct 
violation of the rules and practices of 
civilized warfare. Cities and villages, if 



not destroyed, are being stripped of all 
they contain not only, but often of their 
very inhabitants. The nations asso- 
ciated against Germany cannot be ex- 
pected to agree to a cessation of arms 
while acts of inhumanity, spoliation, 
and desolation are being continued 
which they justly look upon with hor- 
ror and with burning hearts. 

"It is necessary also, in order that 
there may be no possibility of misun- 
derstanding, that the President should 
very solemnly call the attention of the 
Government of Germany to the lan- 
guage and plain intent of one of the 
terms of peace which the German Gov- 
ernment has now accepted. It is con- 
tained in the address of the President, 
delivered at Mount Vernon on the 
Fourth of July last. It is as follows: 

" 'The destruction of every arbitrary 
power anywhere that can separately, 
secretly, and of its single choice disturb 
the peace of the world; or, if it cannot 
be presently destroyed, at least its re- 
duction to virtual impotency.' 

"The power which has hitherto con- 
trolled the German nation is of the sort 
here described. It is within the choice 
of the German nation to alter it. The 
President's words, just quoted, natural- 
ly constitute a condition precedent to 
peace, if peace is to come by the action 
of the German people themselves. The 
President feels bound to say that the 
whole process of peace will, in his judg- 
ment, depend upon the definiteness and 
the satisfactory character of the guar- 
antees which can be given in this funda- 
mental matter. It is indispensable that 
the governments associated against Ger- 
many should know beyond a peradventure 
with whom they are dealing." 

Q. — When did the United States 
declare the Czecho-Slovaks 
and Jugo-Slavs as parties to 
peace settlements? 

A.— On October 18, 1918, in the reply 
to the Austro-Hungarian note. It was: 

"The President deems it his duty to 
say to the Austro-Hungarian govern- 
ment that he cannot entertain the present 
suggestions of that government because 
of certain events of utmost importance, 
which, occurring since the delivery of 
his address of the 8th of January last, 
have necessarily altered the attitude 
and responsibility of the government 
of the United States. Among the four- 
teen terms of peace which the President 
formulated at the time is the following: 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



39 



"'X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, 
whose place among the nations we wish 
to see safeguarded and assured, should 
be accorded the freest opportunity of 
autonomous development' 

"Since that sentence was written and 
uttered to the Congress of the United 
States the Government of the United 
States has recognized that a state of 
belligerency exists between the Czecho- 
slovaks and the German and Austro- 
Hungarian empires, and that the Czecho- 
slovak National Council is a de facto 
belligerent government, clothed with 
proper authority to direct the military 
and political affairs of the Czecho- 
slovaks. It has also recognized in the 
fullest manner the justice of the na- 
tionalistic aspirations of the Jugo-Slavs 
for freedom. 

"The President is, therefore, no 
longer at liberty to accept the mere 
'autonomy' of these peoples as a basis 
of peace, but is obliged to insist that 
•they, and not he, shall be the judges of 
what action on the part of the Austro- 
Hungarian government will satisfy their 
aspirations and their conception of their 
rights and destiny as members of the 
family of nations." 

Q. — Did Austria-Hungary accept 
this condition? 

A— On October 29, 1918, the Swedish 
minister in Washington transmitted 
Austria-Hungary's answer accepting 
the conditions and again asking for an 
immediate armistice on all fronts. 

Q. — Did Germany claim that "ar- 
bitrary power" was to be 
abolished? 

A.— On October 20, 1918, Germany 
addressed the United States thus : 

"In accepting the proposal for an 
evacuation of occupied territories the 
German government has started from 
the assumption that the procedure of 
this evacuation and of the conditions of 
an armistice should be left to the judg- 
ment of military advisers, and that the 
actual standard of power on both sides 
in the field has to form the basis for 
arrangements safeguarding and guaran- 
teeing this standard. The German gov- 
ernment suggests to the President that 
an opportunity should be brought about 
for fixing its details. It trusts that 
the President of the United States will 
approve of no demand which would be 
irreconcilable with the honor of the 
German people and with opening a way 
to a peace of justice. 



"The German government protests 
against the reproach of illegal and in- 
humane actions made against the Ger- 
man land and sea forces and thereby 
against the German people. For the 
covering of a retreat destructions will 
always be necessary, and they are car- 
ried out in so far as is permitted by 
international law. The German troops 
are under the most strict instruction to 
spare private property and to exercise 
care for the population to the best of 
their ability. Where transgressions 
occur in spite of these instructions the 
guilty are being punished. 

"The German government further de- 
nies that the Germany navy, in sinking 
ships has ever purposely destroyed life- 
boats with their passengers. The Ger- 
man government proposes with regard 
to all those charges that the facts be 
cleared up by neutral commissions. In 
order to avoid anything that might 
hamper the work of peace the German 
government has caused orders to be 
dispatched to all submarine command- 
ers precluding the torpedoing of pas- 
senger ships, without, however, for 
technical reasons, being able to guar- 
antee that these orders will reach every 
submarine at sea before its return. 

"As a fundamental condition for peace 
the President characterizes the destruc- 
tion of every arbitrary power that can 
separately, secretly and of its own 
single choice disturb the peace of the 
world. To this the German govern- 
ment replies : Hitherto the represen- 
tation of the people in the German Em- 
pire has not been endowed with an in- 
fluence on the formation of the govern- 
ment. The constitution did not pro- 
vide for a concurrence of representation 
of the people in decisions on peace and 
war. These conditions have just now 
undergone a fundamental change. The 
new government has been formed in 
complete accordance with the wishes of 
the representation of the people, based 
on equal, universal, secret, direct fran- 
chise. 

"The leaders of the great parties of 
the Reichstag are members of this gov- 
ernment. In future no government can 
take or continue in office without pos- 
sessing the confidence of a majority of 
the Reichstag. The responsibility of 
the Chancellor of the Empire to the rep- 
resentation of the people is being legal- 
ly developed and safeguarded. The first 
act of the new government has been to 
lay before the Reichstag a bill to alter 
the Constitution of the Empire so that 
the consent of the representation of the 



40 



Questions and Answers 



people is required for decisions on war 
and peace. The permanence of the new 
system is, however, guaranteed not only 
by constitutional safeguards, but also 
by the unshakable determination of the 
German people, whose vast majority 
stand behind these reforms and demand 
their energetic continuance. 

"The question of the President, i. e., 
with whom he and the governmentsas- 
sociated against Germany are dealing, 
is therefore answered in a clear, un- 
equivocal manner by the statement that 
the offer of peace and an armistice has 
come from a government which, free 
from any arbitrary and irresponsible 
influence, is supported by the approval 
of an overwhelming majority of the 
German people." 

Q. — What was our reply? 

A.— On October 23, 1918, the United 
States replied: 

"Having received the solemn and ex- 
plicit assurance of the German govern- 
ment that it unreservedly accepts the 
terms of peace laid down in his address 
to the Congress of the United States 
on the 8th of January, 1918, and the 
principles of settlement enunciated in 
his subsequent addresses, particularly 
the address of the 27th of September, 
and that it desires to discuss the details 
of their application, and that this wish 
and purpose emanate, not from those 
who have hitherto dictated German 
policy and conducted the present war 
on Germany's behalf, but from minis- 
ters who speak for the majority of the 
Reichstag and for an overwhelming ma- 
jority of the German people; and hav- 
ing received also the explicit promise 
of the present German government that 
the humane rules of civilized warfare 
will be observed both on land and sea 
by the German armed forces, the Presi- 
dent of the United States feels that he can- 
not decline to take up with the govern- 
ments with which the Government of 
the United States is associated the 
question of an armistice. 

"He deems it his duty to say again, 
however, that the only armistice he 
would feel justified in submitting for 
consideration would be one which 
should leave the United States and the 
powers associated with her in a posi- 
tion to enforce any arrangement that 
may be entered into and to make a re- 
newal of hostilities on the part of Ger- 
many impossible. The President has, 
therefore, transmitted his correspon- 
dence with the present German authori- 



ties to the governments with which the 
Government of the United States is as- 
sociated as a belligerent, with the sug- 
gestion that, if those governments are 
disposed to effect peace upon the terms 
and principles indicated, their military 
advisers and the military advisers of 
the United States be asked to submit 
to the governments associated against 
Germany the necessary terms of such 
an armistice as will fully protect the 
interests of the peoples involved and 
insure to the associated governments 
the unrestricted power to safeguard and 
enforce the details of the peace to 
which the German government has 
agreed, provided they deem such an 
armistice possible from the military 
point of view. Should such terms of 
armistice be suggested, itheir accep- 
tance by Germany will afford the best 
concrete evidence of her unequivocal 
acceptance of the terms and principles 
of peace from which the whole action 
proceeds. 

"The President would deem himself 
lacking in candor did he not point out 
in the frankest possible terms the 
reason why extraordinary safeguards 
must be demanded. Significant and im- 
portant as the constitutional changes 
seem to be which are spoken of by the 
German Foreign Secretary in his note 
of the 20th of October, it does not 
appear that the principle of a govern- 
ment responsible to the German people 
has yet been fully worked out or that 
any guarantees either exist or are in 
contemplation that the alterations of 
principle and of practice now partially 
agreed upon will be permanent. More- 
over, it does not appear that the heart 
of the present difficulty has been 
reached. It may be that future wars 
have been brought under the control of 
the German people, but the present war 
has not been, and it is with the present 
war that we are dealing. 

"It is evident that the German people 
have no means of commanding the 
acquiescence of the military authorities 
of the Empire in the popular will; that 
the power of the King of Prussia to 
control the policy of the empire is un- 
impaired ; that the determining initiative 
still remains with those who have hith- 
erto been the masters of Germany. 
Feeling that the whole peace of the 
world depends now on plain speaking 
and straightforward action, the Presi- 
dent deems it his duty to say, without 
any attempt to soften what may seem 
harsh words, that the nations of the 
world do not, and can not, trust the 



America's Principles for World-Settlement 



41 



words of those who have hitherto been 
masters of German policy, and to point 
out once more that in concluding peace 
and attempting to undo the infinite in- 
juries and injustices of this war the 
government of the United States can not 
deal with any but veritable representa- 
tives of the German people who have 
been assured of a genuine constitutional 
standing as the real rulers of Germany. 
If it must deal w'ith the military mas- 
ters and the monarchical autocrats of 
Germany now, or if it is likely to have 
to deal with them later in regard to the 
international obligations of the German 
Empire, it must demand, not peace ne- 
gotiations, but surrender. Nothing can 
be gained by leaving this essential thing 
unsaid." 

On October 27, 1918, Germany re- 
sponded, affirming that far-reaching 
changes had been and were being made in 
the German constitutional structure. 

Q. — On what basis was armistice 
discussion begun? 

A. — On the basis of an American note 
handed to the Swiss Minister in Wash- 
ington on November 5, 1918: 

"In my note of October 23, 1918, I 
advised you that the President had 
transmitted his correspondence with the 
German authorities to the governments 
with which the Government of the 
United States is associated as a bellig- 
erent, with the suggestion that if those 
governments were disposed to accept 
peace upon the terms and principles in- 
dicated, their military advisers and the 
military advisers of the United States 
be asked to submit to the governments 
associated against Germany the neces- 
sary terms of such an armistice as 
would fully protect the interests of the 
peoples involved, and insure to the as- 
sociated governments the unrestricted 
power to safeguard and enforce the de- 
tails of the peace to which the German 
government had agreed, provided they 
deem such an armistice possible from 
the military point of view. 



"The President is now in receipt of 
a memorandum of observations by the 
allied governments on this correspon- 
dence, which is as follows: 

"'The allied governments have given 
careful consideration to the corre- 
spondence which has passed between 
the President of the United States and 
the German government. Subject to 
the qualifications which follow, they de- 
clare their willingness to make peace 
with the government of Germany on 
the terms of peace laid down in the 
President's address to Congress of 
January, 1918, and the principles of 
settlement enunciated in his subsequent 
addresses. They must point out, how- 
ever, that Clause 2, relating to what is 
usually described as the freedom of the 
seas, is open to various interpretations, 
some of which they could not accept. 
They must, therefore, reserve to them- 
selves complete freedom on this sub- 
ject when they enter the peace con- 
ference. 

" 'Further^ in the conditions of peace 
laid down in his address to Congress 
of January 8 1918, the President de- 
clared that invaded territories must be 
restored, as well as evacuated and 
freed. The allied governments feel that 
no doubt ought to be allowed to exist 
as to what this provision implies. By 
it they understand that compensation 
will be made by Germany for all dam- 
age done to the civilian population of 
the Allies and their property by the 
aggression of Germany by land, by sea, 
and from the air.' 

"I am instructed by the President to 
say that he is in agreement with the 
interpretation set forth in the last para- 
graph of the memorandum above 
quoted. I am further instructed by 
the President to request you to no- 
tify the German government that Mar- 
shal Foch has been authorized by the 
Government of the United States and 
the allied governments to receive prop- 
erly accredited representatives of the 
German government and to communi- 
cate to them terms of an armistice." 



AMERICAN FIGHTERS IN FRANCE 



Q. — How many American troops 
went to Europe in 191 7? 

A. — Altogether 187,928. In May, 1917, 
the month following declaration of a state 
of war, 1,718 sailed. In June 12,261 went. 
In the following months the embarka- 
tions were : July, 12,988 ; August, 18,323 ; 
September, 32,523; October, 38,259; No- 
vember, 23,016; December, 48,840. 

Q. — How many did we send in 
1918? 

A. — Up to August the monthly embark- 
ations for 1918 had been : January, 48,776 ; 
February, 48,027; March, 83,811; April, 
117,212; May, 244,345; June, 276,372; July, 
enough over 300,000, to make a total of at 
least 1,320,000. In the first 20 days of 
July the embarkations were 234,000, a 
daily average of 11,700 men. 

Q. — Were these troops all under 
one command? 

A. — They were all under command of 
General John Joseph Pershing, Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the American army 
abroad. 

Q. — How was this army organ- 
ized? 

A. — In July, 1918, it was announced 
that part of the overseas force was in five 
army corps, designated as First, Second, 
Third, Fourth and Fifth, forming the 
First Field Army. 

Q. — What is the official designation 
of the over-seas army? 

A. — It is designated as "The American 
Expeditionary Forces." 

Q. — How large was the whole 
American army? 

A. — In July, 1918, the entire American 
army, at home and over-seas, had grown 
to 2,170,400 men. Of these 2,010,000 were 
enlisted men and 160,400 were officers. 

Q. — What was the size of the army 
when war began? 

A. — The Secretary of War said in a 
report of June 28, 1918: 

"1. Since April 6, 1917, the regular 
army has increased from 5,791 officers 
and 121,797 enlisted men to 11,365 officers 
and 514,376 enlisted men; the National 



Guard in Federal service from 3,733 of- 
ficers and 76,713 enlisted men to 17,070 
officers and 417,441 enlisted men; the Re- 
serve Corps in actual service has in- 
creased from 4,000 enlisted men to 131,- 
968 officers and 78,560 enlisted men ; the 
National Army has been created with an 
enlisted force of approximately 1,000,000 
men. 

"The army has increased in, fourteen 
months from 9,254 officers and 202,510 
enlisted men to approximately 160,400 
officers and 2,010,000 enlisted men. 

In August, 1918, General March, Chief 
of Staff, told Congress that the whole 
army on August 1 had become 3,012,012 
men, apportioned as follows : Oversea 
force, exclusive of Marines, 1,301,742; in 
the United States and insular possessions, 
1,432,706; August draft, 277,664. 

Q. — How many Americans were in 
the great fighting of July and 
August, 1 91 8? 

A. — On July 20, soon after the big 
Allied offensive was under way, 270,000 
American troops were engaged between 
Chateau-Thierry and Soissons alone. 
Seven divisions and at least one separate 
regiment participated. That would mean 
that at least 160,000 American troops 
were actually in the fierce fighting, the 
others being on the lines of supply, etc. 
In addition there were 30,000 men east of 
Rheims, making the whole number of 
Americans engaged 200,000 men at least. 
More were thrown in as the battle pro- 
gressed. 

Q. — What troops were engaged 
first? 

A. — The 42d, or Rainbow, Division, 
composed of National Guard troops from 
twenty-six States and the District of 
Columbia, including the New York 69th 
Infantry, then designated as the 165th In- 
fantry, fought in the Champagne east of 
Rheims. 

The six other divisions were associated 
with the French in the counter-offensive 
between Chateau-Thierry and Soissons. 
These were the 1st, 2d, 3d, and 4th of the 
regular army, the 26th National Guard 
Division, composed of troops from the 
six New England States, and the 28th, 
composed of the Pennsylvania National 
Guard. Marines were included in this 
number. 



42 



American Fighters in France 



43 



Q. — What American troops became 
known as "devil-dogs"? 

A. — The United States Marines, who 
figured so strikingly in the first really 
heavy American fighting against the Ger- 
mans that the latter called them "Teufel- 
hunde," which is "devil-dogs" in English. 
Of course the Marines were greatly de- 
lighted with the involuntary compliment, 
and lost no time in spreading it. 

Q. — Why are they called "Soldiers 
of the Sea"? 

A. — Because they are trained especially 
for fighting ashore. They are organized 
into brigades and regiments. Transports 
manned by the Navy are maintained to 
carry these soldier-sailors under the com- 
mand of their own officers. The Marine 
Corps is a separate branch of the navy, 
bearing the same relation to the rest of 
the navy as the artillery bears to the rest 
of the army. While forming a part of the 
crew of a war ship, they may be stationed 
at any gun, except gun turrets. As a 
rule, they man the Torpedo Defense 
Battery. 

Q. — Is the U. S. Marine Corps of 
recent organization? 

A. — The Marines were the first of our 
regular services to don the American uni- 
form. Before the Continental Congress 
formed the Army and Navy, it mustered 
in "two battalions of American Marines" 
on the tenth of November, 1775. In 1805, 
as Soldiers of the Sea, a company of 
Marines under Lieutenant O'Bannon 
hauled down the flag of the Bey of 
Tripoli ; then ran up the first American 
flag to fly over a captured fortress in the 
Old World. 

Q. — What was the first activity of 
the Marines in this war? 

A. — In less than an hour after the 
declaration of a state of war was signed 
by the President, marines from the 
Philadelphia Navy Yard, under Captain 
Robert L. Denig, U.S.M.C, seized three 
ships interned at the docks in Philadel- 
phia, the Rhaetia, Franconia and Pr'uiz 
Oskar. The first armed troops to land 
in France were the 5th Regiment of the 
U. S. Marine Corps. 

Q. — Where did the Marines first 
fight in France? 

A. — At Chateau Thierry, in the Marne 
angle. They were put in during June 
and early July, 1918, to face the great 
German drive to the river Marne, and 



they distinguished themselves by not only 
succeeding in establishing an invincible 
defense, but by making decided advances, 
and especially by clearing fiercely con- 
tested points of vantage which later 
proved to be of great value when the big 
counter-offensive began. 

Q. — Had other American troops 
distinguished themselves be- 
fore this? 

A. — Yes. American army troops (com- 
posed both of regulars and of the Na- 
tional Army or citizen troops) had done 
exceedingly well some months earlier in 
various places, and perhaps especially so 
in holding lines west of Montdidier after 
the German drive toward Amiens, March- 
April, 1918. But the later engagements 
of the Marines were at a decidedly crit- 
ical time and place and the fighting was 
of very considerable magnitude. 

Q. — How big is the Marine force? 

A. — When the dispatches of 1Q18 first 
told about the Marines being in the front 
line, we had a Marine force of 56,545 
men, and it was growing rapidly by daily 
enlistments all over the country. The 
peace strength of the Marine Corps was 
limited, being only 13,266 men with 426 
officers at the opening of war with Ger- 
many. 

Q. — Did the draft increase the 
Marine Corps? 

A. — Neither the Navy nor the Marine 
Corps depended on the draft. They 
were recruited by voluntary enlistment. 
The Marine Corps has always been pop- 
ular among adventurous young men be- 
cause of its romantic record. Among the 
voluntary enlistments was a whole college 
battalion enlisted as one. 

Q. — Are the Marines normally kept 
together? 

A. — No. Normally they are scattered 
throughout the fleet and on posts through- 
out the world. Every capital ship (battle- 
ship, amored cruiser, etc.) carries a com- 
plement of Marines. Smaller vessels as- 
signed to special duties in foreign waters 
carry Marines if there is any likelihood 
that men may have to be landed. 

Q. — Do both sides use the same 
system of trenches? 

A. — Practically. After the German 
trench-systems were severely punished by 



44 



Questions and Answers 



the British and French method of pound- 
ing them for days with destructive long- 
range fire of almost incredible severity, 
the Germans did devise a certain change, 
by which they established the so-called 
"pill-box system." But except for this 
modification, the system is much the same 
on each side. 

Q.__What are "pill boxes?" 

A. — The "pill box" is a name given by 
the British to a concrete block-house in- 
troduced by the Germans, during the early 
part of 1917, in an endeavor to find a 
better method of defense against the 
Allies' gun-fire than the trench system. 
These block-houses are scattered to a con- 
siderable depth over the country to be 
defended and have proven to be a very 
effective system of defense. Most of 
them are garrisoned by twelve men and 
armed with one or more machine guns. 
Some of the larger ones have garrisons 
of as many as sixty men. 

Q. — What are trench gates? 

A. — The modern trench is divided into 
sections by gates faced with barbed wire. 
Their purpose is to prevent raiding parties 
from rushing along the trench. Often the 
operation of opening the gate is slow and 
involved so that a party of raiders shall 
lose too many precious moments in get- 
ting through, even if it is clear how the 
gate can be opened. 

Q. — Are the men close together in 
the trenches? 

A. — In very important places the sol- 
diers may be shoulder to shoulder. In 
other places not so important or not open 
to sudden attack, the trenches may be held 
so thinly that there is a man only every 
few yards. Some trench-lines are held 
only by scattered machine-gun companies. 

Q. — What is the difference between 
a machine gun and a rifle? 

A. — The rifle is the great one-man 
weapon of war. It is mobile — that is, the 
man can carry it with him anywhere and 
he can carry a large amount of ammuni- 
tion for it. He can use it quickly and 
easily. Its mechanism is such that a com- 
mon soldier easily learns how to take care 
of it. 

The machine gun is much heavier, re- 
quires more than one man for its efficient 
use, and fires such huge quantities of am- 
munition that that cannot be carried by 
the soldiers themselves, but must be trans- 
ported specially. Its mechanism is more 



complicated and thus requires special 
knowledge and training. 

Q. — Must soldiers at the front live 
in trenches all the time? 

A. — No. Only the soldiers actually 
holding the front-lines are in trenches, 
and even they are not kept there for too 
long a time. The custom is to relieve 
men from trench duty as often as it can 
be done. The soldiers not on trench duty 
are well behind the front-lines, generally 
safely beyond all danger of gun-fire from 
the enemy. They live in villages, can- 
tonments, and, sometimes, in tents — but 
mostly they dwell with pretty complete 
comfort in houses. 

Q. — How do American soldiers 
live when training for the 
front? 

A. — The men are generally billeted in 
villages, and frequently sleep in barns. 
The first thing they do in taking up their 
quarters is to police the community. Po- 
licing means, largely, cleaning up and 
moving or burning everything that endan- 
gers health and order, purifying the water 
and making sure in general of sanitary 
arrangements. There is nearly always a 
store or two selling American matches, 
groceries, canned things, and, in fact, 
pretty nearly everything a general store 
would carry — but no liquor. 

Q. — When did our boys take over 
part of the front line? 

A. — In February 5, 1918, there was pub- 
lished in the United States a statement 
that "the sector occupied by the American 
troops is northwest of Toul." 

Q. — Where was this? 

A. — This description showed that they 
were occupying a line between Pont-a- 
Mousson and St. Mihiel, the latter the 
farthest southern salient of the famous 
Verdun positions. 

The American troops had the formid- 
able line of Toul-Nancy-Luneville behind 
them — one of the greatest of the French 
fortification systems. 

Q. — Was not this the scene of the 
first big fighting in the war? 

A. — Early in the war the French tried 
to break through into Germany from the 
gateway of the land dominated by Nancy. 
Successful at first, they were forced back, 
and the Germans, in turn, tried to break 



American Fighters in France 



45 



through this immense sector of fortifica- 
tions (Verdun - Toul - Nancy - Luneville) 
and sweep forward into France. They 
made a considerable advance, actually 
threatening Nancy with capture. But 
though the French forces had met a bad 
defeat in the battles of August 20, 21, 
1914, they succeeded in the end in holding 
the German forces much on the lines still 
occupied three years later. > 

Q. — When American troops took 
over this front line, was any 
German territory held by the 
Allies? 

A. — Yes. In Alsace. South of Lor- 
raine the French held trenches in German 
territory, extending from Colmar, a town 
in Alsace, to the Swiss border. It was 
a small strip, but of great sentimental and 
moral value to the French. 

Q. — What is a forlorn hope? 

A. — It is a service so desperate that few 
or none of the men who undertake it may 
hope to survive. For this reason, officers 
rarely order men to forlorn hope service, 
but call for volunteers. 

A forlorn hope rarely is called for 
among troops who are on the offensive. 
It is almost always a part of a desperate 
defensive, such as blowing up a bridge 
under terrific bombardment, holding some 
post to delay a victorious enemy, and 
so on. 

Now and then a victoriously advancing 
commander may call for forlorn hope 
service to attack some formidable posi- 
tion, knowing that the men will be de- 
stroyed but hoping that they will also de- 
stroy the enemy stronghold, and thus, by 
sacrificing their own lives, save the lives 
of many comrades. 

Q. — When a trench is heavily bom- 
barded, are the men not al- 
lowed to retreat from it? 

A. — Soldiers posted in a trench must 
stay in it till they get direct orders to 
leave it. They may crouch in bomb- 
proof excavations within the trenches and 
otherwise conceal themselves from the 
bursting projectiles, because they know 
that while the shells are falling on their 
trench, the enemy soldiers cannot assault 
it. But were they to leave it, the enemy 
might instantly stop his fire and send his 
troops in. A breach thus made in even a 
limited section of front might affect an 
army-front of many miles. 



Q. — Why should a successful 
breach in an army front im- 
peril hundreds of miles? 

A. — While a successful breach is ex- 
tremely difficult to establish, as we have 
said, such a breach, if sufficiently wide, 
may let the enemy force men and guns 
through and expand them into army for- 
mation on the other side, thus raising a 
formidable menace of rear-attack. 

A modern army-front cannot simply 
walk away from its position. Hundreds 
of huge cannon must be moved, and these 
are as heavy as industrial machinery. 
Thousands of other guns, lighter, but still 
not easily moved, must be saved from 
possible capture. Hundreds of tons of 
supplies have to be shifted. For this rea- 
son a threatened army cannot wait too 
long. It cannot always assure itself that 
the breach in its line is serious. The 
only absolute safety is to fall back and 
re-form where the enemy again may be 
faced by a solid and unpenetrated front. 



Q. — Is it possible for men to live 
through a bombardment di- 
rectly on the trenches? 

A. — Yes. The trenches are deep but 
narrow, and on the side toward the enemy 
there is a high mound of earth or of 
sand-bags. No matter how accurate ar- 
tillerists may be, it is impossible to aim 
so accurately that the shells shall actually 
fall and burst inside of the trenches. 
Most of them hit the sheltering mound or 
drop just in front of them. The ex- 
plosion of these shells rarely does direct 
damage to the men in the trenches, and 
the greatest danger from them is caused 
by flying fragments of the bursting shell. 

Another proportion of shells flies over 
the trench and bursts just beyond. These 
are more dangerous if they explode close 
to it, because the rear of the trench is 
not so well protected, though modern 
trenches do have mounds erected against 
this "back-fire." 

Even if shells burst in the trench, how- 
ever, they are not necessarily fatal to 
anybody, because of the bomb-proofs 
scattered along the trenches to give men 
shelter. 

In addition, as the trenches are not 
straight, but zig-zag, a shell bursting in- 
side of a trench cannot send its frag- 
ments through more than a limited area. 

"Shell-shock" is the thing that, prob- 
ably, puts more men out of commission 
than actual wounding or killing. 



4 6 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What is barrage fire? 

A. — Literally it means a fire to bar men. 
It is an artillery method which has be- 
come possible only through the modern 
improvements in guns and time-fuse 
shells, and the use of airplanes, tele- 
phones and wireless to keep the artiller- 
ists constantly informed as to the effect of 
their work. 

When it is decided to establish a bar- 
rage, a line of guns is so fired as to drop 
an incessant shower of shells along a 
given zone. This bursting inferno, which 
is kept up for as many minutes or hours 
as may be demanded by the particular 
operation, is a barrage through which no 
number of men can pass. 

Q. — How is barrage used? 

A. — A barrage may be "laid down" be- 
hind an enemy's front line, thus cutting 
that front line off from re-enforcements, 
supplies, etc. This is done by so drop- 
ping the shells that they explode contin- 
ually along every communication road 
and on every depot of supplies. When 
the front line has been thus cut off, a 
charge by a superior number of opponents 
may result in the destruction or capture 
of all the isolated men. 

Another way to use a barrage is by 
"advancing" it gradually — that is, the bar- 
rage first falls on a certain part of the 
enemy line, and the attacking troops ad- 
vance just behind it. The guns then lay 
the barrage a little further ahead, and 
the attacking force advances again, and 
so on. This is known as "creeping bar- 

ra S e " 

Creeping barrage aims to demolish first 

the enemy barbed-wire entanglements ; 
then the enemy trenches ; then the com- 
municating trenches, and so on, thus 
clearing the way for the attacking 
troops. 

If an attack is threatened on its own 
trenches, the artillery tries to lay down a 
defensive barrage — that is, it tries to 
make a zone of explosive fire in front of 
its own trenches to prevent the assailants 
from approaching, and if the attack is 
serious, it tries to lay a heavy barrage 
behind the assailants, for the double pur- 
pose of preventing re-enforcements and 
of preventing their retreat, thus making 
possible their capture or destruction. 

Q. — What is the difference between 
a defeat and a rout? 

A. — A defeat, even though it may be 
of the utmost gravity, still leaves the de- 
feated force in some sort of coherent or- 
ganization. It may not be able to fight 



again, but it has a chance. Even if it 
has no real chance left, it still remains a 
factor to be reckoned with. Until it is 
eliminated, the enemy, however victori- 
ous, has not obtained a free hand. 

A rout, on the other hand, is not only 
an utter defeat, but it is the elimination 
of the defeated force. A routed force, 
big or little, is one that has no organiza- 
tion left. It has disintegrated into indi- 
viduals who are fleeing in disordered mul- 
titude, leaving their military equipment on 
the field, and not seeking to make a stand 
anywhere, except as desperation may 
drive them. 

Q. — If a soldier crawls into an en- 
emy trench to spy, and is 
caught, what happens to him? 

A. — If he is in the uniform of his own 
army, he must be treated like any other 
prisoner of war. If he is disguised in 
any way, either in civilian garb or the 
enemy uniform, he is subject to treatment 
as a spy. 

Q. — Could raiders not get into a 
German trench with machine 
guns and clean it out? 

A. — They could clean out only a small 
part, because all trenches, German and 
Allied, are so dug that there are no very 
long straight stretches. Every little while 
there is a sharp bend. This is done for 
the very purpose of preventing such an 
occurrence as an "enfilading fire," which 
is the technical term for raking a military 
position. 

Q. — What is the meaning of 
"troops in reserve?" 

A. — In battle only a certain proportion 
of troops are engaged on each side. It is 
one of the purposes of each commander 
to tempt or force his opponent to throw 
in all his men, while he himself holds his 
■own men "in reserve" — that is, he keeps a 
great force of men safely in the rear with 
the object of suddenly hurling in these 
fresh, unwearied, unshaken men when 
the men of the other side are tired out. 

Q. — Why would it not be better to 
push all the men in at once and 
thus strike a crushing blow in 
the very beginning? 

A. — It would be excellent, if it could 
be done. Sometimes, under very unusual 
circumstances, a military genius does do 
it, and he wins a great victory. But it 



American Fighters in France 



47 



cannot often be done. The geography of 
a battle-front, the necessity of guarding 
innumerable possible points of attack and 
so on, force generals to bring only a part 
of an army into actual combat at first. 

But there is another big reason for not 
throwing in all available men at once. It 
is the same reason that leads a prize- 
fighter not to put all his strength into 
the first few rounds — the fear of physical 
exhaustion. Men become vastly exhaust- 
ed in battle. They must, after a few 
hours, get relief or support. It has hap- 
pened many times in history that victori- 
ous troops have so worn themselves out 
to win, that in the end they were too 
tired to drive the victory home, and so 
lost its fruits because no reserves were 
available. 

Q. — What is shell-shock? 

A. — Shell-shock is a condition of tem- 
porary mental, nervous and physical col- 
lapse caused by an explosion occurring 
in close proximity to the individual, or by 
a prolonged period of exposure in a place 
where there is very heavy and incessant 
bursting-fire. 

The most usual cases of shell-shock are 
caused by one big explosion very close to 
the victim. Paralysis, mental stupor, in- 
tense sensitiveness of the superficial 
nerves, violent pains that often appear to 
have no real reason, involuntary muscular 
motions, deafness, sometimes blindness 
and dumbness — any or all of these symp- 
toms may be observed in sufferers. 

The condition first became a decidedly 
big hospital-fact in the present war. 
Much has been done to relieve it, but 
there still is much to learn about it. The 
chief line of treatment is directed toward 
cheering the mind of the patient and 
soothing the nervous condition or build- 
ing it up. The fortunate fact about it 
appears to be that it is generally tempo- 
rary. The period of recovery, however, 
may be very long indeed. 

Q. — Is it true that soldiers have 
liquor given to them before go- 
ing over the top? 

A. — Our men apparently are not to have 
liquor doled out to them, but the British 
practice has been to give the men a "tot" 
of rum (the liquor made from sugar- 
cane syrup) before going into any diffi- 
cult action and also after unusual ex- 
posure to weather. 

The French are very liberal with wine, 
and, in fact, French soldiers drink it 
largely in place of water. The American 
army management has not laid down the 



principle of teetotalism as an iron-clad 
law, and experience will no doubt be the 
guide. 

Q. — Do the officers go into the 
trenches with the soldiers? 

A. — The lieutenants do almost always, 
to a number sufficient to maintain efficient 
command of the company or the detach- 
ment in each particular trench sector. 
The non-commissioned officers, of course, 
accompany their squads. 

The captain of a company usually is 
with his men if the whole company oc- 
cupies a particular sector. Otherwise he 
may remain on detached duty in the rear, 
or he may occupy a bomb-proof or other 
station in the trenches or behind them 
where he can maintain uninterrupted tele- 
phone communication with his men. 

Q. — Are the men in the trenches 
under pretty constant gun-fire? 

A. — Sometimes men may hold trenches 
throughout their entire tour of duty with- 
out receiving a hostile shot. Many times 
soldiers hold considerable extents of 
trenches for two or even more weeks and 
experience only occasional shelling. It 
all depends on the conditions of war at 
the time. Even when things are pretty 
active along the entire front as a whole, 
there will be sections of front that seem 
to be neglected. 

Q. — Do the men in the trenches 
have to cook their own food? 

A. — Sometimes. In extreme cases 
where a very heavy and sustained bom- 
bardment destroys communications, they 
have to fall back on the emergency ra- 
tions which each modern soldier carries 
with him. 

In the ordinary course of the trench- 
war, however, hot meals are delivered 
with notable regularity. The field-kitch- 
ens behind the trenches supply the food, 
and it is carried in big cans through com- 
munication trenches to the men. 

Q. — Have the men in the trenches 
no cannon with which to de- 
fend themselves? 

A. — Cannon would be of no possible 
use in trenches. The enemy trenches are 
so close to ours that machine-gun and 
rifle-fire make a perfect defense. Even 
if cannon were of any use in trenches, 
which they are not, it would be mad- 
ness to put them there, because any drive 



4 8 



Questions and Answers 



that succeeds in breaking through a trench 
anywhere would thus result in a loss of 
valuable artillery. 

Modern artillery has such immense 
range that it can perfectly defend the 
trenches from situations so far behind 
them that it is absolutely out of danger 
of capture from any ordinary attacks. 

Q. — What is the trench-mortar? 

A. — This is a weapon produced by the 
modern trench-warfare. It is a little 
mortar, so light that it can be transported 
with ease by a couple of men; and un- 
like other gunnery weapons it requires 
comparatively little science. Practically 
speaking, it simply supplements the hand- 
thrown grenade — that is, it throws a bomb 
into the enemy trench in the same way 
in which a man would toss a hand- 
grenade. 

Its range does not have to be much 
greater than that attained by a hand- 
thrown bomb, for it is used solely for 
trench-to-trench war. It shoots its big 
oval or sausage-shaped bomb well up into 
the air with a muffled boom, and the pro- 
jectile describes a big curve. The bomb 
is fitted with a time-fuse as a rule, but 
may also be made to explode on impact. 

Q. — Do aircraft drop many bombs 
into the trenches? 

A. — Very few. The anti-aircraft guns 
force airplanes to remain as high as from 
5,000 to 10,000 feet. At this height the 
trenches are only like a thin streak to the 
airman's eye. In addition, as an airplane 
can never stop while in the air, but must 
keep moving continuously and at a high 
speed, it is practically impossible to fix 
the right instant for dropping a bomb so 
that it will hit any small object below 

Therefore trenches are rarely badly 
bombed, except when some very extraor- 
dinary circumstance gives a plane the 
chance to swoop low and speed along the 
length of a trench for a sufficient distance 
to loose bombs with some degree of ac- 
curacy. 

Q. — Have the men in trenches any 
shelter against the weather? 

A. — Sometimes the trenches, especially 
where a line has been held for some time, 
are fitted with very comfortable under- 
ground dwellings with light and heat. 
But men soon become inured to outdoor 
exposure. City people, softened by house- 
living, do not realize how large a propor- 
tion of every population spends the great 
part of its life in exposure to all kinds 



of weather, not only without suffering, 
but actually with much better health than 
the city-dwellers. 

Q. — How do soldiers in France get 
water? 

A. — In the army zone, reservoirs and 
hydrants are erected near camps-, bar- 
racks and hospitals, and tank stations 
spaced along the roads for the accommo- 
dation of the traveling kitchens and mo- 
tor tank wagons. These hold 1,000 gal- 
lons and they bring water to the fighting 
line, where it is removed in kegs or skins 
into the trenches. 

A water supply is also obtained from 
springs and properly fitting them out to 
avoid contamination. Wells are cleaned 
out, disinfected and provided with a 
pumping plant. Many new wells are 
driven, and where a large supply of water 
is required, veritable waterworks have 
been constructed, with pumping machines 
and pipe lines several miles in length. 
The water supply department of the 
French Army consists of 3,500 men and 
75 officers. It has fitted out 3,800 existing 
wells and sunk 2,000 new ones. The total 
amount of piping laid amounts to 200 
miles. 

Q. — What is the exact technical 
composition of a "sector"? 

A. — Technically it is that part of the 
front line occupied by a battalion. The 
organization of a sector consists of: 

(1) Accessory defenses which are made 
to arrest and retard the enemy advancing 
under fire of the defense ; 

(2) The first line of surveillance occu- 
pied by a few men from which all ground 
in front can be well seen ; 

(3) The line of resistance occupied 
strongly, which must be defended what- 
ever happens ; 

(4) Lines of support which are strongly 
organized centers, defended while new 
lines in the rear are being formed ; all 
are connected by communication trenches 
and protected by barbed wire. 

Q. — What is the first thing men do 
in a trench if they see enemies 
approaching to attack? 

A. — Soldiers rarely attack a trench-line 
that way. A trench usually is pounded by 
artillery first, to destroy it and drive its 
defenders out, or so stun and decimate 
them that they cannot offer resistance to 
the enemy charge, which does not follow 
till the artillery has done its work. 

Against a charge such as is suggested 



American Fighters in France 



49 



the men in the trenches would direct a 
converging fire from all the machine guns 
in their line, supplemented by "sheet- 
fire" from their rifles, all discharged as 
fast as the defenders can shoot, so as to 
make a zone of destruction through 
which assailants cannot pass. 

Meantime they will have telephoned or 
telegraphed to their headquarters in the 
rear, and the officers there will instantly 
order heavy fire from their artillery to 
sweep the front of the threatened trench 
sector. 

Q. — Is No Man's Land a neutral 
zone? 

A. — It is just the reverse. The zone 
between the opposing trenches is called 
No Man's Land because it is not possible 
for either side to hold it, and because no 
man may venture on it except at immi- 
nent risk of death. It is over this No 
Man's Land that the daring detachments 
from both sides creep out at night to make 
raids on the enemy lines, or to gather 
information. 

Q. — Is the term "Jam Pot" a nick- 
name for something else? 

A. — In the very early stages of the war 
it was a nickname only in a partial sense. 
The British troops, being unprepared for 
hand grenade work, while the Germans 
were well equipped for that kind of war- 
fare, converted jam pots and similar 
things into emergency grenades, loading 
them with explosives and tossing them 
into German trenches with lighted fuses 
attached. Now that the Allies are well 
supplied with regular grenades, the term 
remains as a nickname pure and simple. 

Q. — How many kinds of hand 
grenades are there? 

A. — So many that apparently only a 
few specialists in explosives can tell off- 
hand how many varieties are being used. 
They are all similar, however, in the main 
principle : that is, whatever their shape 
and size may be, they are high-explosive 
bombs to be tossed by hand-power into 
enemy positions. Some are thrown like a 
baseball. Others are hurled from slings. 
Still others are attached to sticks. 

The most simple are provided with a 
common fuse that is lit by the soldier just 
before he tosses the grenade. The more 
elaborate ones are fitted with very in- 
genious exploding devices, some being so- 
called time-fuses, others being contact 
devices. 

The great object is to insure explosion 



of the bomb the moment it gets to the 
"right place." Slow fuses often enable 
the enemy to snatch a bomb when it ar- 
rives and throw it back at the men who 
sent it. On the other hand a fuse that 
discharges the grenade too swiftly may 
make it burst "at home." 

Q. — Does the term "sapper" mean 
anything? 

A. — It means literally a soldier who 
saps — that is, drives a tunnel or a trench 
toward an enemy position. Such an ap- 
proach by digging is known as "sapping" 
and the trench or tunnel is called a "sap." 

Sappers, miners and pioneers are among 
the very oldest military formations of the 
world. They were important parts of 
armies long before gunpowder was in- 
vented. The Romans, who besieged Car- 
thage in the days of Hamilcar and Han- 
nibal, used sapping extensively. 

The modern sapper is part of the en- 
gineer corps of the army, and sappers are 
employed like the other arms of that 
service for all kinds of engineering work, 
from building roads and bridges to driv- 
ing the old-fashioned tunnel under an 
enemy fortification and blowing it up. 

Q. — Is the so-called fire-trench an 
advanced trench? 

A. — No. The fire-trench is the actual 
front line of trenches permanently held 
by the regular front-line troops. It rep- 
resents the true and actual battle-front. 
It is called "fire-trench" to distinguish it 
from the many subsidiary trenches of a 
defense system, such as communication 
trenches, lateral trenches, listening post 
trenches, etc. 

Q. — Are listening posts inside of 
the trenches or outside? 

A. — Listening posts are in No Man's 
Land between the trenches. They are in 
trenches that have been dug out toward 
the enemy trench, and they are as near 
to the foe as the conditions permit. They 
are elaborately surrounded with barbed 
wire, and are used mostly at night, when 
a soldier creeps into the post and listens 
for any sound in the enemy lines that 
may warn him of an intended raid, of any 
movement or transfer of troops, etc. 

Q. — Why do men at the front call 
an unexploded shell a "dud"? 

A. — "Dud" is a slang English word, 
meaning something the same as the 
American slang-word "dub." It was a 



50 



Questions and Answers 



natural thing to apply the term to a shell 
that fails to explode after it strikes. 

Q. — If two armies not quite equal 
in numbers meet, must the 
smaller one always take the de- 
fensive ? 

A. — If the armies are well matched in 
quality and in natural positions, the 
smaller one must take the defensive al- 
most always, but not always. It depends 
on the commanding officers. If these are 
well matched, the larger army will usually 
force the offense, thus leaving nothing 
but defense to the smaller. But a supe- 
rior general often assumes a successful 
offensive with a smaller army; and, vice 
versa, an inferior general will prosecute 
an offensive with his larger army so un- 
skilfully that as the battle develops he 
will find himself forced into the de- 
fensive. 

Q. — What would be the military 
advantage to either side of go- 
ing through Switzerland? 

A. — If it were not for the fact that 
Switzerland is prepared to defend her 
neutrality bloodily, a surprise attack 
through the northwestern corner of 
Switzerland, where it abuts on the Ger- 
man and French lines, might be of ad- 
vantage, for the assailant could hope to 
push so big an army through that his 
enemy's whole front would have to fall 
back. 

Thus German forces pouring through 
that corner might force an abandonment. 
of the entire Vosges line and leave the 
French Verdun line critically "in the air." 

A French invasion of Germany through 
that part of Switzerland might force the 
Germans to abandon all of Alsace. 

Considered in practical detail, however, 
such an attack would present huge diffi- 
culties to either side. The troops and 
their vast lines of supplies would have 
only very narrow mountain valleys to pass 
through, and either side could probably 
block the narrow outlets. 

Q. — How can an American send 
gifts to soldiers at the front? 

A. — By parcel post or express, but only 
if sender can show a written request from 
the soldier, approved by his commanding 
officer. Tie parcel securely, but do not 
seal, as it must be inspected. 

The sender's name and address should 
be written plainly on the upper left hand 
corner. 



The address of the soldier must be as 
follows : 

JOHN SMITH, 

Company C, 9th Infantry, 

American Expeditionary Forces, 
France. 

The exact location or station of the 
company must not be given on the ad- 
dress. 

Q. — Must foreign tariff duty be 
paid on gifts sent to men 
abroad ? 

A. — The following announcement has 
been received through the State Depart- 
ment of the conditions whereby gift par- 
cels containing dutiable goods sent by 
parcel post may be delivered free of duty 
in Great Britain, when intended for offi- 
cers and men of the U. S. Army and 
Navy serving in the United Kingdom, for 
soldiers of American nationality serving 
in the British or Canadian forces, or for 
American medical officers serving in Brit- 
ish military or base hospitals : 

"The British Board of Customs an- 
nounce the following conditions whereby 
gift parcels containing dutiable goods may 
be delivered free of duty: Such parcels 
intended for officers and men of United 
States Navy in United Kingdom should 
be addressed for delivery on board ship 
in which addressee is serving ; when in- 
tended for members of American Army 
in United Kingdom, should be addressed 
to regimental address of recipient ; when 
intended for soldiers of American nation- 
ality in British or Canadian armies or for 
American medical officers serving in Brit- 
ish military or base hospitals, should be 
addressed in care of Committee for 
American Soldiers and Sailors of the 
American Red Cross, 154 New Bond 
street, London, England, which committee 
will verify right of addressee to duty-free 
concession and arrange for delivery of 
parcels. Dutiable goods must be specific- 
ally described as tobacco, cigarettes, 
chocolate, etc. Foregoing relates solely 
to dutiable goods imported by parcels 
post." 

Q. — What postage must our men 
abroad pay on mail to Amer- 
ica? 

A. — Under an Act of Oct. 3, I9I7, # all 
troops, sailors and marines of the United 
States serving abroad are entitled to free 
postage on their mail back to the United 
States provided that this mail bears the 
sender's name, etc., in the upper left hand 



American Fighters in France 



5i 



corner or bears other evidence to indi- 
cate that it is from a soldier or sailor. 

Q. — What is meant by "tagging" 
a soldier? 

A. — All armies engaged in the war, 
with the possible exception of the Rus- 
sians, supply their men with identification 
tags, generally worn on a string passing 
around the neck. Modern warfare is so 
terrible that the ordinary means of iden- 
tification fail completely, and if it were 
not for these tags families would be 
caused untold misery because of inability 
to learn the fate of their loved ones. The 
British soldier is provided with a circular 
aluminum tag containing his draft num- 
ber, name, regiment and religion. The 
French are using a metal tag made in 
duplicate and capable of being split. This 
allows one half of the tag to be left with 
the dead body while the other half is 
forwarded to the proper authorities for 
checking purposes. The Germans make 
use of a similar tag. The American Navy 
has a tag which is decidedly unique, in 
that it carries the thumbprint of the 
bearer. 

Q. — What is the cost of equipping 
an American infantryman? 

A. — The War Department states that 
the cost of equipping the average soldier 
is $156.71. Of this amount $101.62 is ex- 
pended for clothing, $7.73 for eating uten- 
sils, and $47.36 for fighting equipment. 

Q. — What are the food require- 
ments of a large army? 

A. — For an army of 500,000 men two 
and a half million pounds of food must be 
allowed daily. In a month an army of 
this size will use thirteen million pounds 
of beef, fifteen million pounds of pota- 
toes, one million pounds of coffee and 
three million pounds of sugar. 

Q. — Is the Government employing 
women telephone operators to 
go abroad? 

A. — Women telephone operators to be 
sent abroad by the War Department will 
wear a distinctive uniform and will be 
considered from a military standpoint as 
in a similar position to the members of 
the British Women's Auxiliary Corps, 
according to information given out by 
the U. S. Signal Corps. Wives of Army 
officers and enlisted men now in Europe 
or about to go will not be accepted for 
the unit, it is stated. It is very probable 
that a large number of women will be re- 



quired as General Pershing has found it 
impossible to obtain satisfactory opera- 
tors with the necessary linguistic require- 
ments. To become eligible to this unit 
women must be between twenty-three and 
thirty-five years of age, with a few pos- 
sible exceptions in case of maximum age. 
They must be in good health, and speak 
both French and English with ease. It 
is preferred that they have had some ex- 
perience in telephone switchboard operat- 
ing, as even in cases of experienced 
operators it has been found necessary to 
give some preliminary training in this 
country before sending them abroad. Sal- 
aries range from $60 to $125 a month, 
with allowances of rations and quarters, 
the same as now accorded to Army 
nurses. 

Q.— What is meant by the "Hin- 
denburg Line?" 

A. — The Hindenburg Line is a system 
of German entrenchments on the western 
war front, so called after the commander 
of the German Field Forces, who estab- 
lished it after the Somme fighting in 1916. 
This line, which was maintained through 
1917 and until open warfare suddenly be- 
gan in 1918, consisted of three main sec- 
tions, the northern end being the "Wotan" 
line, the center the "Siegfried" line and 
the southern end the "Albrecht" line. It 
had the general shape of a crescent, with 
the horns at the North Sea on the north 
and the Aisne River on the south. 

Q. — How were American troops 
placed at first? 

A.— Early in the campaign the Allied 
front was divided into three sections, a 
British front from the North Sea to the 
Oise River, a distance of about 125 miles, 
a French front from the Oise to Verdun, 
some 150 miles; and an American front 
from Verdun to the Swiss frontier. The 
plans provided for an independent system 
of railroads from each front to certain 
selected seaports, making distinct lines of 
communication from the sea to the firing 
line. The American front generally was 
designated as the "Lorraine Front." 

Q. — What are the duties of a com- 
pany clerk when his company 
is sent to France? 

A. — Ordinarily a company clerk would 
perform his duties away from the firing 
line. The exigencies of the service, how- 
ever, especially in war time, demand many 
departures from ordinary rules and 



52 



Questions and Answers 



customs and a company clerk going 
abroad may be required to perform duty 
anywhere. 

Q. — How many shoes does a sol- 
dier need? 

A. — General Pershing has requested 
shipment of 18,590 pairs of shoes for each 
25,000 men monthly, which is approxi- 
mately nine pairs of shoes per man per 
year. "This quantity," said Secretary 
Baker, "is in excess of actual consump- 
tion, and is being used by General Persh- 
ing to build up a reserve for all troops in 
France. When such a supply is accumu- 
lated, the quantities will be reduced." 

The Quartermaster-General's Depart- 
ment had on hand before the end of 
February, 1918, and due on outstanding 
contracts 7,564,000 field shoes and 7,873,- 
000 marching shoes. By July, 1918, 27,- 
249,000 pairs of shoes had been bought 
for the entire army, at home and over- 
seas. 

Q. — Are there accurate figures 
showing the magnitude of gen- 
eral army supplies? 

A. — Yes, and the magnitude is astound- 
ing. Between April, 1917, when we en- 
tered war, and August 1, 1918 (15 
months), the War Department bought 
and delivered 55,958,000 pairs woolen 
socks, 10,507,000 pairs woolen breeches, 
9,000,000 woollen coats, 5,377,000 over- 
coats, and 4,373,000 spiral puttees (leg- 
gings). 

There were purchased 9,860 motor am- 
bulances, 17,988 motor trucks, 3,420 pas- 
senger cars, 27,000 motorcycles, and 
25,874 side-cars for motorcycles. 

Animals amounted to 237,007 horses 
and 129,385 mules. Of these all were 
bought in the United States except 58,093 
horses and 5,745 mules which were 
bought in France. 

Q. — What extra army pay is al- 
lowed for foreign service? 

A. — Foreign service pay is twenty per 
cent of the pay of the grade without the 
war increase. For instance, an enlisted 
man who receives $15 on his first enlist- 
ment, if serving in France, will receive $3 
for foreign service pay and $15 war in- 
crease, a total of $33. 

Q. — How many soldiers voted in 
the first election under arms? 

A. — In the election of November, 1917, 



the entire military vote (cast by recruits 
in national encampments at home, citizen 
soldiers in France, and citizen sailors on 
naval vessels) was 50,475. 

Q. — How much does it cost to feed 
a soldier? 

A. — A little less than 40 cents a day 
in the camps in the United States. The 
figures from one camp, Camp Devans in 
Massachusetts, show that when the men 
were first assembling there the cost for 
each man per day was 40^2 cents. In 
September, 1917, when the supply had 
been organized thoroughly the cost was 
3854 cents. 

Q. — How can soldiers in France 
get eyeglasses if they break the 
ones they have? 

A. — There are optical units with the 
army. A base plant is provided with 
elaborate optical machinery and work- 
men, capable of turning out several hun- 
dred pairs of glasses a day with all the 
accuracy of an optical manufacturing es- 
tablishment at home. Automobile units 
will work immediately behind the lines 
for emergency repairs, fitting, etc. 

Q. — How many soldiers can a ship 
carry ? 

A. — The old estimates used to be one 
man to every two tons of cargo capacity. 
This was the European army usage. 
There has been some dispute in America 
since the troops began to go over-seas, 
because some experts hold that two tons 
is not a sufficient allowance for a modern 
soldier with the great amount of equip- 
ment and supply that must accompany 
troops. The Secretary of War adhered 
to the two-ton calculation. Others as- 
serted that the amount needed for each 
man was five tons, but it may be said that 
this is extreme. It is evident that some 
of the experts who hold to the five-ton 
calculation are figuring not simply on 
the acutal transport per man, but also on 
the tonnage needed to continue sending 
supplies after the man has landed in 
France. 

Q. — Does a soldier's outfit actually 
weigh two tons ? 

A. — Not at all. "Tons" means space, 
not weight. This "tonnage" measurement 
of merchant ships really was not invent- 
ed by sailors or ship-builders. It was 
devised by tax-collectors. In the days 



American Fighters in France 



53 



of the Stuarts in England it was decided 
by that habitually hard-up government to 
levy port taxes and dues of all sorts on 
shipping. To ascertain what each vessel 
should pay, the tax collectors devised the 
scheme of taxing each according to the 
number of "tuns" (great hogsheads) that 
it could carry. These tuns probably 
were selected because at that time wine, 
tobacco, and many other cargoes were 
carried in tuns. Certain measurements 
of cargo space were laid down, and, ac- 
cording to this "tunnage" the ship was 
taxed. 



Q. — What are corps troops? 

A. — They are an addition to the army 
corps devised to meet the necessities of 
warfare on the French front. When the 
five-division corps was organized, this 
body of "corps troops" was added. Corps 
troops are made up of artillery units, 
engineers and many other types of serv- 
ice battalions, and their duty is to main- 
tain the line of communication for their 
own corps. They comprise about 30,000 
men. 



Q. — What is a line of communica- 
tion? 

A. — In the first place, you must under- 
stand that it is a "line" only technically. 
Actually it is the system of roads and 
depots situated safely behind an army, 
from and over which there must go an 
unending stream of supplies to the troops 
in front. An American field army in 
France (which would consist of five 
army corps) must have from 125,000 to 
130,000 men (corps troops) to maintain 
all the avenues of supply. As a matter of 
fact, General Pershing's "lines of com- 
munication" extend from the Lorraine 
trenches clear across France to the ports 
where the ocean transport service lands 
the supplies from America. 



Q. — What "lines of communica- 
tion" had we built in France? 

A. — By the summer of 1918 we had 
developed enormous ports in France ca- 
pable of handling 750,000 tons a month. 
American foresting organizations had 
gone into the French woods, erected saw- 
mills shipped "knocked-down" from 
America, and built docks and other fa- 
cilities. 



Fourteen regiments and nineteen bat- 
talions railway engineers (over 45,000 
Americans) were engaged in railroad con- 
struction and operation in France. Nine 
regiments of railway engineers had been 
in France since August, 1917. 

There were produced by August, 1918, 
for the railroad operations of the War 
Department in France more than 22,000 
standard gauge freight cars, and more 
than 1,600 standard gauge locomotives in 
addition to purchases of cars and loco- 
motives abroad. 

A double line of railroad communica- 
tion had been secured from the French 
by army engineers, extending from the 
coast of France to the battlefront. It 
included the construction of hundreds of 
miles of trackage for yards and the nec- 
essary sidings, switches, etc. 



Q. — How will American artillery- 
be repaired in France? 

A. — A huge artillery base was started 
early in 1918 to cost approximately 25 
million dollars. The works were planned 
to have a capacity for re-lining more than 
800 big guns a month (putting in new 
bores and rifling to replace the core worn 
out by firing). There was also to be a 
works for repairing 50,000 small arms 
and machine guns a month with a re- 
loading plant to re-load about 100,000 
artillery cartridges a day. To do all 
this (and to make the repairs on motor 
vehicles and the other equipment), 
more than a hundred buildings were 
necessary. 



Q. — How was our army off for 
artillery ? 

A. — Sixteen plants were built here, 
many of them "from the ground up," to 
produce heavy artillery of every type. 
The first of four government-owned shell- 
fitting plants had begun to produce by 
August, 1918, in addition to many private 
plants already long engaged in quantity 
production. Motorization of field artil- 
lery was well under way. A 5-ton ar- 
mored truck had been developed in 1918 
to haul 4.1-inch howitzers, weighing 9,000 
pounds, over rough country. Approxi- 
mately $90,000,000 was being spent to pro- 
duce nitrates for explosives. The plan for 
our artillery operations in France was 
colossal. It included everything from 
trench mortars to 16-inch monsters. 



TROOP TRANSPORT OVER SEAS 



Q. — Did American troops go to 
Europe immediately after war 
was declared? 

A. — The first American force of any 
size was sent in June, two months after 
the American Declaration of War, which 
was made April 6, 1917. 

Q. — Were the first troops sent in 
warships ? 

A. — No. They were sent in merchant 
vessels fitted out as transports, and armed 
only lightly with a few light, quick-firing 
naval guns, firing 5- and 6-inch shells. 

Q. — How can such transports de- 
fend themselves ? 

A. — They are expected to defend them- 
selves only in a pinch. They are pro- 
tected by warships. 

Q. — Why could not troops be sent 
in battleships? 

A. — Because there is not enough room 
on warships to carry any considerable 
number of soldiers. In addition, the 
function of a warship is to seek for and 
meet an enemy, whereas the function of 
a transport is to avoid him. 

Q. — How do warships defend 
transports ? 

A. — Warships defend transports against 
the attack of enemy warships by convoy- 
ing them. To do this, the transports, 
steaming in line or in double line, are 
surrounded by cordons of warships of 
different types. 

Far in advance, and sweeping the ocean 
on both sides, sometimes as far as three 
hundred miles away, are the swift scout 
cruisers, whose mission it is to find the 
enemy and wireless the warning to their 
own ships. 

Surrounding the transports and keep- 
ing them always in sight, are the heaviest 
ships, the battle-cruisers and dread- 
naughts. It is their business to meet an 
attacking foe at such a distance from the 
transports, that he cannot come within 
range of them. Forming separate cor- 
dons are swift, light cruisers and de- 
stroyers — some ranging far over the seas 
to scout, others staying close to the trans- 
ports to protect them against destroyer 



attack, which is particularly to be feared 

at night. 

Q. — Has not the submarine 
changed the convoy system? 

A. — Yes. The fact that the big ships 
of the German Navy cannot take the sea 
is what has made cordons of cruisers and 
battleships unnecessary for our trans- 
ports. Against submarines alone these 
big vessels are not needed, and, indeed, 
would be useless. 

As the only menace to our transports 
comes from submarines, the convoying 
vessels may consist wholly of destroyers, 
whose greatest value is their speed. Ow- 
ing to this speed, a limited number of 
destroyers can establish a very intensi- 
fied patrol around quite a large fleet of 
transports. 

As they have speeds ranging from 28 
to 36 miles (statute) an hour, it is cal- 
culable that a submarine showing its peri- 
scope exactly between two destroyers five 
miles apart, would have both of them 
down on it in exactly five minutes, if they 
were thirty-mile boats. 

Q. — How can destroyers find sub- 
marines? 

A. — Only by continued cruising and 
watching. There are only two factors 
that are really in the destroyers' favor. 
One is that the submarine naturally tries 
to lie on the surface (for resting its men, 
replenishing its air-supply, and re-charg- 
ing its electric motors) whenever the 
commander thinks it safe. The other fac- 
tor is that a submarine cannot successfully 
attack a vessel without, at least, getting 
a glimpse of it from the surface. That 
means that the submarine must show its 
periscope, and, furthermore, must leave 
a noticeable wake as it moves along close 
under the surface. 

Q. — What is the periscope? 

A. — It is, in effect, a great eye at the 
top of a mast-like tube, about 5 inches in 
diameter. This eye is a very powerful 
lens, and when the periscope tube has 
emerged from the water, the watchers in 
the still submerged submarine see a re- 
flected image of any vessels within the 
range of sight. The powerful lens at 
the top is so made that it gets a maxi- 
mum amount of view. The observer in 



54 



Troop Transport Over Seas 



55 



the submarine can turn it in all direc- 
tions. The most modern submarines have 
a very wonderful "all-around" periscope, 
which reflects a view of the whole en- 
circling water-world in all directions. An 
elaborate system of lenses within the tube 
reflect this image into the observation 
room of the submarine. 

Q. — Is not the periscope a very 
small object? 

A. — Very small, and its visibility to 
others varies according to conditions. In 
a very smooth sea it sometimes shows up 
with surprising distinctness. In rough 
water, or when the sun happens to be 
wrong, it is very hard to see, being only 
about 5 inches in diameter. 

Q. — Is there no other way to de- 
tect a submarine? 

A. — Yes. When a submerged sub- 
marine has come so close to the surface 
that it can protrude its periscope, it 
creates a noticeable commotion on the top 
of the water. The periscope tube in it- 
self makes a wake, and a bigger disturb- 
ance still is caused by the movement of 
the large hull under the surface. 

Q. — Can the submarine lie still and 
await its prey? 

A. — No. A submarine that has been 
brought near the surface to make an at- 
tack, cannot lie still in that position. It 
must keep moving, if it is to retain its 
level. To lie motionless, a submarine 
must either come wholly to the surface 
or it must so fill its ballast tanks as to 
sink. If a submarine with periscope pro- 
truding were to stop its propeller, which, 
with its balancing fins, keeps it in a de- 
sired depth, it would bob up like a cork 
and be a big mark. A submarine, even 
when submerged, never has so much water 
ballast aboard as to destroy its buoyancy. 
It must retain its tendency to float to the 
surface, otherwise it would be bound to 
sink. 

Q. — How long is the periscope 
tube? 

A. — From 18 to 20 feet in the average 
submarine. The submarine thus can sight 
a ship while it still is that far below the 
surface. 

Q. — Does the submarine sink if its 

tube is shot away? 

A. — No. The only effect is to make it 
"blind"— that is, without a periscope the 



crew of the submarine would have to 
bring their craft to the surface so that 
they could see through the glass-win- 
dowed conning-tower if they wanted to 
attack ships. But the loss of the peri- 
scope does not prevent them from navi- 
gating under water and they can, there- 
fore, run away . submerged until they get 
clear of an enemy zone. After that they 
can run on the surface when no foe is 
near, and so get home. But they can 
do no more torpedoing from submerged 
position. Thus, though they can still 
manage to get back to port, their capac- 
ity for harm would be gone. 

Q. — Why not simply shoot away 
their periscopes and thus make 
them harmless? 

A. — That is one of the various things 
the submarine-hunters try to do. But it 
is very difficult. It cannot be done ex- 
cept now and then by lucky chance. The 
mark is too small. Besides, as we know 
now, the submarines have mechanics who 
can make remarkable repairs. Besides, 
modern submarines have spare periscopes. 
Every submarine nowadays has at least 
two, and it is understood that the very 
latest German submarines have more. 

Q. — When the periscope protrudes, 
will exploding shells sink the 
submarine ? 

A. — Twenty feet of water, or much less, 
make a powerful cushion against explo- 
sion. While a good part of the shock is 
transmitted through the water, a greater 
part of the explosive violence goes in 
the lines of least resistance; that is, the 
air. In addition, there is the immense dif- 
ficulty of hitting exactly that part of the 
water under which the submarine is mov- 
ing. There comes, too, the fact that 
shells impinge on the sea at an angle, 
and this makes many of them "ricochet" 
— that is, they bound, much as a tennis 
ball does. 

Q. — What do the soldiers on a 
transport do when a torpedo 
hits? 

A. — The soldiers are, of course, drilled 
every day in putting on the life preserv- 
ers, and hastening to the lifeboats, which 
generally hold about 48 men each. Each 
man goes to a particular boat and sits in 
a certain seat. The signal to take to the 
boats is five short blasts on the ship's 
whistle. Each lifeboat is in command of 



56 



Questions and Answers 



an officer, and absolute order and silence 
are imposed on all. 

Q. — What happens when the ex- 
plosive shell strikes the water? 

A. — A great deal depends upon the 
shape of the shell and the angle at which 
it strikes. The shells in general use have 
been inclined to bound from the water 
into the air, especially when the water has 
been smooth, and the shells struck the 
water at an angle of less than 10 de- 
grees. Sometimes these shells have trav- 
eled for a straight mile after bounding 
before striking the water again. A shell 
designed to overcome this tendency, and 
known as a diving shell, has been devised 
by American naval engineers. 

Q. — How long does it take a ship 
to make a round-trip to France? 

A. — It ought to take big, modern ships, 
such as the requisitioned German Vater- 
land and others, only about three weeks 
to take a load of men and supplies to 
France and get back to an American port. 
As a matter of fact, however, the under- 
takings are so great that it has taken 40 
days and more to make a round trip. 
Aside from the congestion, the faster 
ships are held down in speed by the 
necessity of taking the rate of speed 
on a given trip that the whole convoy 
must adopt, which is, of course, the speed 
of the slowest ship in it. By August, 
1918, we had cut the time for a round 
trip to about a month under favorable 
circumstances. 

Q. — What is a depth-bomb? 

A. — It is the best device so far found 
for fighting the submarine. Depth-bombs 
are bombs loaded with 200 or 300 pounds 
of very high explosive, generally trinitro- 
toluol. They are carried in a special ap- 
paratus at the stern of ships that hunt 
submarines, and they are so adjusted that 
they can be dropped into the sea instantly 
by pulling a lever. 

Q. — How are they used? 

A. — When a destroyer or other sub- 
marine-hunting vessel sights a periscope, 
it races toward the spot at full speed, 
generally firing as it goes. While the 
submarine generally manages to submerge 
before the patrol-ship can reach it, there 
is almost always a surface disturbance, 
due to the motion of the under-water 
craft. If the patrol vessel can reach the 



spot in reasonably good time, there is a 
fair chance to ascertain with some degree 
of accuracy where the submarine is. The 
bombs are dropped then, and they ex- 
plode under water. 

Q. — Suppose the depth-bomb does 
not hit the submarine? 

A. — It will explode anyway. Depth- 
bombs are provided with an appliance 
that is set to go off automatically at any 
desired depth. As the force of the ex- 
plosion under water is enormous, a sub- 
marine may be damaged sufficiently to 
sink it if the bomb explodes anywhere 
within one hundred feet of it. 

Q. — What is a smoke-box? 

A. — It is a box pierced with holes and 
filled with chemicals. When it is desired 
to screen a vessel from a submarine, the 
box is thrown overboard. Water rushes 
in and the chemicals immediately produce 
a dense smoke, which hides the ship ex- 
actly as if it had entered a fog bank. 

Q. — Is it true that the British lost 
hardly any soldiers at sea dur- 
ing the war? 

A. — They had astoundingly few losses. 
At the end of January, 1918, it was an- 
nounced in England on the authority of a 
naval authority (unnamed) that since the 
beginning of the war only 9 British trans- 
ports had been sunk, and that the total 
loss of life was only 2,000. In that time 
11,000,000 soldiers had been transported 
for greater or shorter distances. The 
bulk of this huge transportation figure, 
of course, is produced by the troops that 
were moved back and forth across the 
English Channel. 

Q. — Did we lose any troops at sea? 

A. — The losses were astoundingly small. 
July 1, 1918, the Secretary of War re- 
ported : "The total number of our troops 
lost at sea and casualties is 8,165, and of 
these, by reason of the superbly efficient 
protection which the navy has given our 
transport system, only 291 have been lost 
at sea." 

Q. — Did we lose any transports? 

A. — Three, but their men were saved 
with exception of the number noted. The 
losses to August 1, 1918, were Antilles, 
torpedoed October 17, 1917; Zaanland, 
torpedoed May 13, 1918; President Lin- 
coln, torpedoed some time later; Mount 
Vernon, torpedoed in early September, 
1918, with loss of only 35 men. 



MAN UNDER WATER 
(The Submarine) 



Q. — Who invented the first sub- 
marine? 

A. — So far as is known the first sub- 
marine was built by an American named 
Bushnell, in 1775. It was a one-man af- 
fair, manually propelled, and was just 
large enough to hold the navigator. It 
was built of wood, and was submerged by 
admitting water, which was pumped out 
when the occupant desired to come to the 
surface again. The air in the boat 
would support life for thirty minutes. 
Bushnell used his boat during the Ameri- 
can War of Independence, and tried to 
attach a bomb to the bottom of the Brit- 
ish warship Eagle. It, however, failed 
to explode. Fulton, also an American, 
and the originator of the steamboat, de- 
voted some time to submarine boats. He 
used manual propulsion, but, by making 
use of compressed air, he was able to stay 
beneath the water for four hours. Di- 
rectly encouraged by Napoleon, he built 
a boat for France in 1801. 

Q. — Did Americans ever use sub- 
marines in war? 

A. — Many submarines, all manually pro- 
pelled, were built during the American 
Civil War, but Holland, in 1877, was the. 
first to build a really efficient submarine, 
mechanically propelled. He, too, was an 
American, so that we can truthfully say 
that the submarine was an American in- 
vention. The French did more to develop 
the craft than any other people, but the 
original idea was not theirs. The inter- 
nal combustion engine made the subma- 
rine possible, just as it made possible the 
aeroplane and Zeppelin. 

Q. — How big are English sub- 
marines ? 

A. — The latest pre-war British type, the 
F class, of which there were eight built, 
or building, in 1914, has a displacement 
of 1,200 tons, 5,000 horsepower, a surface 
speed of 20 knots, and a submerged speed 
of 12 knots. They have six torpedo tubes, 
and two quick-firing guns. The AEi and 
AE2, which were lost, were 800 tons, and 
had engines of 1,750 horsepower, which 
gave them a surface speed of 16 knots. 
Submerged, they could do 10 knots. They 
had four torpedo tubes and two quick- 



firers. They were 176 feet long and 23 
feet diameter. The latest French vessels, 
though smaller than the huge Fs, have 
almost all eight torpedo tubes. Particu- 
lars of the German submarines are not 
available, but they are, at least, as large 
and as powerful as our own. 

Q. — When did we build our first 
modern submarine? 

A. — Congress made an appropriation in 
March, 1893, for building an experimental 
boat, and Holland obtained the contract 
in competition with other inventors who 
submitted designs and bids. It was not 
until 1895, however, that he was able to 
begin construction of the first submarine, 
named Plunger. It was designed for 
steam power on the surface and electric 
power submerged, and was launched in 

1897, but by that time Holland had so 
many improved ideas that he left the 
Plunger unfinished and built a new boat — 
Holland No. 8. Again he made improve- 
ments and replaced the second boat with 
Holland No. 9, which was launched in 

1898, and became the American navy's first 
submarine. 



Q. — What is the Diesel engine? 

A. — It is the most successful type of 
internal combustion engine using heavy 
oil. It can be driven with ordinary pe- 
troleum, and does not require the highly 
explosive oils used in motor car and aero- 
plane engines. The main difference be- 
tween this engine and other heavy-oil en- 
gines which preceded it, is in the fact that 
no external combustion is applied, and 
no actual explosion takes place. It has 
to operate at much higher pressure than 
any other internal combustion engines, 
and this caused some alarming accidents 
in the early days of its use. The present 
machines are safe and easy to operate. 
Owing to the perfect combustion of the 
oil there is hardly any dirt or smell, and 
very little waste of power. Less than 
one-half pint of crude oil gives one brake 
horsepower. It is the invention of a Ger- 
man, Otto Diesel, who committed suicide, 
under peculiar circumstances, and it 
has been greatly improved during the 
war. It is used in the German sub- 
marines. Diesels are already consider- 



57 



58 



Questions and Answers 



ably used in auxiliary sailing ships, and 
several very successful Diesel motor 
ships have made voyages as long as 5,000 
miles. 

Q. — What is the very latest Ger- 
man submarine like? 

A.— Rear-Admiral^ Degouy, of the 
French Navy, who is one of the leading 
naval experts of the world, gave some 
account of them in the Revue des Deux 
Mondes, published in Paris. He said 
that there is a submersible armed with a 
veritable "armored battery," constructed 
over a nearly cylindrical shell. "This 
battery, provided with 'a number (as yet 
unascertained) of guns of 120 — perhaps 
even of 150 — millimeters (5 or 6 in.) — 
would be flush with the surface of the 
sea, and the part of the shell unprotected 
with armor would be covered by the 
water. All that would be necessary would 
be to defend that portion of the subma- 
rine above the water against the weak 
guns of merchantmen armed for de- 
fense...! shall speak now of the 2,000- 
ton submarine, which certainly has been 
put in service, probably at the same time 
as the commercial submarine Deutschland, 
whose tonnage is no less. Judging from 
the characteristics which are attributed to 
this new craft, it will readily be seen that 
we have here a deep-sea cruiser most ac- 
ceptable for operating along the Allies' 
lines of communication with America. 
These are the details : Length, 85 meters 
over all ; four Diesel motors of 7,000 
horsepower; speed of 22 knots (14 when 
submerged) ; ability to cover 6,500 sea 
miles on the surface (in other words, 
twice _ the distance across the Atlantic) ; 
capacity for fresh water and provisions 
enough to last six or eight weeks ; arma- 
ment consisting of 8 torpedo tubes for 
sixteen 55-centimeter torpedoes, 50 auto- 
matic mines, 4 medium-sized guns (per- 
haps of 150 millimeters, perhaps of 120), 
adapted for firing against aircraft; upper 
bridge lightly armoured ; two boats ; fifty 
men in the crew, together with five of- 
ficers, including two mechanicians." 

Q. — Have we anything like the 
same number of submarines as 
Germany? 

A. — We have not, and in this war we 
do not need them. The German object in 
submarine warfare is destruction of mer- 
chant tonnage, and for this purpose they 
need as big a fleet of under-water boats 
as they can possibly turn out. America 
and the Allies have for their stategic 
object the destruction of enemy warships 



and nothing else, if these ever come out of 
their "holes" to fight. 

Submarines are of only limited value 
for fighting other submarines, and the 
work can be done far better by destroy- 
ers ; Therefore, the American Navy can 
limit its submarine fleet to the numbers 
actually desirable for operations against 
warships. However, we have a decidedly 
imposing fleet. It numbered more than 
75 in 1917 before we entered war, and it 
has been heavily increased. 

Q. — Have we more than one kind 
of submarine? 

A. — Yes. We have two kinds — the 
smaller submarine, known as a coast de- 
fense submarine, and the larger sea-go- 
ing kind, which is known as a fleet sub- 
marine, because it is designed to accom- 
pany a fleet in sea operations. 

Q. — Are any American submarines 
equal to the biggest German 
ones? 

A. — We have applied the lessons learned 
during the war, but the details are natur- 
ally not things to publish, though most 
naval students know pretty well what the 
United States is accomplishing. Before 
the war began we had already started the 
construction of many under-water ves- 
sels, which were twice the size of any- 
thing that ever had existed in American 
fleets before then. 

These big fleet submarines were almost 
300 feet long, and they were of 1,000 to 
1,200 tons and more, practically equalling 
in tonnage some of our modern destroy- 
ers. They were designed to carry enough 
fuel (oil) to go from 6,000 to 7,000 miles 
on the surface and 3,000 miles submerged, 
with speed close to 20 knots (22^2 statute 
miles) on the surface (by oil-driven 
motor), and 12 to 14 knots under the sur- 
face (by electric motor). 

They were armored, carried batteries 
of at least three 4-inch rifled cannon, and 
had ten torpedo tubes. 

Q. — What made the German use of 
submarines hideous? 

A. — They destroyed ships without warn- 
ing, or, at best, if they gave warning, set 
crew and passengers adrift, in small boats, 
sometimes at a great distance from land. 
Thus they regularly violated international 
law and humanity ; while in special cases 
(particularly with the crews of the 
Q-boats or decoy craft) they committed 
barbarities of "f rightfulness" which horri- 
fied the world. 



Man Under Water (The Submarine) 



59 



Q. — Did British submarines per- 
form notable exploits? 

A. — The British submarine E-9 got al- 
most under the guns of Heligoland Sep- 
tember 13, 1914, and torpedoed the Ger- 
man light cruiser Hela (2,000 tons) prac- 
tically in the fortress zone. But the most 
notable exploit (and probably the most 
brilliant submarine exploit ever per- 
formed) was the exploit of the British 
B-11 which, on December 11, 1914, made 
its way into the Dardanelles, passing 
under five rows of mines ! This daring 
submarine deed resulted in the torpedo- 
ing of the Turkish battleship Messoudieh, 
10,000 tons, actually inside of the land 
and sea defenses of Turkey. 

Q. — What was the enemy's chief 
success? 

A. — Probably the most spectacular 
instance of the fighting powers of the 
submarine was furnished in the torpedo- 
ing of three big British cruisers by one 
submarine, which attacked and destroyed 
them in turn, early in the war. 

The British ships were all of the same 
type — armored cruisers of 12,000 tons 
each. Their names were Aboukir, Cressy, 
and Hogne (names commemorating three 
famous British victories). They were op- 
erating toward the German North Sea 
base of Kiel on September 22, 1914, when 
the German U-29 struck one with a tor- 
pedo. The others tried to stand by, and 
were torpedoed in swift succession and 
sunk. 

Q. — How many battleships did 
submarines sink during the 
war? 

A. — Up to the beginning of 1918, the 
battleships listed as submarine losses 
were : Formidable, 15,000 tons, torpedoed 
January 1, 191 5, in the North Sea; Go- 
liath, 13,000 tons, sunk May 12, 1915, 
Dardanelles ; Triumph, 12,000 tons, sunk 
May 25, 1915, Dardanelles; Majestic, 
15,000 tons, sunk May 27, 1915, in Dar- 
danelles ; Cornwallis, 14,000 tons, sunk 
September 1, 1917, in Mediterranean. 

These were the British losses, and do 
not count in such losses as the Audaeious, 
which was sunk mysteriously, but prob- 
ably not by a submarine. 

The French had lost the battleship 
Bouvet 12,000 tons, sunk March 18, 1915, 
at the Dardanelles ; and the Stiff em, 13,- 
000 tons, sunk November 26, 1916, off 
Lisbon. 

The Italians had lost no battleships by 



submarine action, though they lost a num- 
ber of large armored cruisers, as did the 
French and British. Italian battleship 
losses were due to explosion and mines. 

The Germans, having kept their fleet 
in hiding, had lost only an armored 
cruiser and three light cruisers, all sub- 
marined in the Baltic in 1915. The Aus- 
trians have, apparently, lost only one 
cruiser to submarines. The Turks lost 
the Messoudieh, and the battleship Kyehr- 
Ed-Din, torpedoed in the Sea of Mar- 
mora Sept. 8, 1915. 

Q. — Can submarines fight subma- 
rines? 

A. — Not when submerged, though 
towards the end of 1917 they 
were being more and more employed to 
locate the enemy. They can, of course, 
fight each other with guns and torpedoes 
on the surface, but that is only like other 
craft. Submerged, they cannot fight each 
other, because the crew of submarines 
cannot see under water. It is true that 
the conning-towers have glazed look-out 
places, but even in clear water .the den- 
sity of the water-world is such that men 
can see only a few yards. It is conceiv- 
able that two submarines might, by guess 
and luck, blunder into each other, and 
try to use torpedoes; but it is a remote 
possibility. 

Q. — Are duels under seas likely in 
the future? 

A. — There remains a chance that sound- 
transmitting apparatus may be so highly 
perfected that a submarine can find its 
prey by sound, and succeed in determin- 
ing its^ whereabouts even though it re- 
mains invisible. In that case, there may 
some day be under-water hunts by and of 
submarines. 

It is the dream, of course, of naval in- 
ventors to discover some way to make 
fairly extended sight possible under 
water. This would make the submarine 
more than doubly as dangerous to sur- 
face ships as it now is, for then it might 
approach a ship without showing its peri- 
scope at all. But so fa<r there has been 
nothing to indicate the probability of this. 

Q. — Can submarines rest on bot- 
tom? 

A. — Yes, if the water is deep or quiet 
enough so that no sea-motion reaches 
them, to make them "pump"— that is, to 
pound. 



6o 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Were the American destroy- 
ers really effective in the war- 
zone? 

A. — Very effective, but not, as the 
American people first assumed, through 
destroying submarines. The effectiveness 
was by patrol, by covering the war-zone 
with constantly cruising watching vessels 
of vast speed, and thus limiting both the 
time and the radius of action of the sub- 
marines sharply. 

Q. — Did our destroyers not sink 
many submarines? 

A.— In January, 1918, Commander J. K. 
Taussig, U. S. Navy, who commanded 
the first American destroyer squadron 
that crossed the sea, made a public ad- 
dress in New York, describing the work 
done by these vessels during seven months 
of war. The facts that he gave showed 
that destruction of submarines was only 
a part of the real task and importance of 
the anti-submarine patrol. He said that 
the effective system (1) was a convoying 
cordon of destroyers to defend the con- 
voyed vessels against such submarines as 
came to them to attack ; and (2) an offen- 
sive patrol of destroyers to sweep the 
seas looking for submarines and attack- 
ing them wherever found. 

Q. — How about the many reports 
of destroyed submarines? 

A. — Commander Taussig said in refer- 
ence to this matter : 

"I cannot say that we sank many sub- 
marines. The submarine, I found, was a 
very difficult bird to catch. He has tre- 
mendous advantage over the surface 
craft. In the first place, he always sees 
you first. As he was not after destroyers, 
he avoided us wherever he could. That 
is, if he saw a destroyer on the horizon, 
the submarine always went the other 
way." 

Q. — Did the Commander say that 
none had been sunk? 

A. — He said : "When we saw a sub- 
marine, which sometimes happened fre- 
quently, and, at other times, might not 
happen during several weeks, we would 
immediately go for him full speed, and 
open fire with our guns in the hope of 
getting in a shot before he submerged, 
but he always submerged very quickly. 
Only once did my vessel, in seven 
months, actually succeed in firing at a 
submarine. He then went down after 



the fifth shot was fired. At that time he 
was five miles away." 

Q. — Is the torpedo the submarine's 
only weapon? 

A. — No. Modern submarines carry 
guns on deck, which are stowed in water- 
tight depressions when submerged. But 
against troop transports their only wea- 
pon is the torpedo, because, in order to 
attack a transport by gun-fire, they would 
have to come to the surface and thus 
would inevitably be sunk by the convoy- 
ing vessels. 

Q. — Just what is a torpedo? Is it 
anything like the shell fired 
from a gun? 

A. — The torpedo is a shell and a craft 
combined — that is, it acts like an explo- 
sive shell when it strikes its mark, but, 
instead of being fired at the mark, it 
actually propels itself, like a little boat. 

Q. — What does it look like? 

A. — Like a cigar, if you can imagine a 
polished steel cigar from eighteen to 
twenty feet long, and weighing rather 
more than a ton, the very big ones weigh- 
ing 3,000 pounds. 

Q. — Why is it so long? Does it 
carry such a huge amount of 
explosive? 

A. — No. It does carry a pretty big 
load of explosive, but its great length is 
due to the elaborate machinery that it 
contains. 

Q. — Where does it carry the ex- 
plosive? 

A. — In its pointed steel snout, which is 
known as the warhead. The full-service 
torpedo carries 250 pounds of gun-cotton 
there. 

Q. — Where is the machinery? 

A. — In its long body behind the ex- 
plosive. It is a beautifully devised little 
turbine engine that works with com- 
pressed air, and gives the torpedo a speed 
as high as forty miles an hour so long as 
the compressed air supply holds out. 

Q. — How long a time is that? 

A. — Long enough to drive a torpedo 
through the sea for as much as four 
miles — quite long enough, therefore, to 



Man Under Water (The Submarine) 



61 



hit its mark, for a torpedo generally is 
fired at a mark very much inside of that 
distance. 

Q. — How is the torpedo fired from 
the ship? 

A. — It is fired, or, rather, propelled 
from the ship by a blast of compressed 
air, or a very light powder charge, that 
does nothing further than to toss it into 
the sea. 

Q. — Does the torpedo always point 
in the right direction when it 
strikes the water? 

A. — It generally does, but it does not 
need to. The ingenious machinery within 
it is so set that it steers the weapon to- 
ward the target for which it was ad- 
justed. 

Q. — And will it maintain that direc- 
tion? 

A. — Not always. Sometimes a big wave 
may so strike it that it "deflects," that is, 
turns aside. 

Q. — When a torpedo deflects, what 
happens ? 

A. — The torpedo turns back to its orig- 
inal direction automatically, because it is 
fitted with a gyroscope that keeps it per- 
fectly true or forces it back continually 
to the original true direction. 

Q. — Then the torpedo really is not 
a projectile at all? 

A. — No. It is really a little automatic 
torpedo boat. 

Q. — How does it explode? 

A. — It explodes when it hits a ship. 
There is a firing-pin in its tip, and this 
detonates a small quantity of fulminate 
of mercury, one of the most sensitive and 
violent explosives known. The detona- 
tion of this, in turn, explodes the gun- 
cotton. 

Q. — Does the torpedo not have to 
pierce the ship ? 

A. — No. It is not powerful enough to 
do so. It is the explosion of the gun- 
cotton outside of the ship that blows a 
hole into it. The water, being non-com- 
pressible, forms a solid cushion, and this 
drives the full force of the explosion 
against the vessel. 



Q. — How did the Germans manage 
to turn out enough torpedoes? 

A. — Their apparent ability to produce 
all that the U-boats needed was a con- 
stant marvel to naval experts of the 
world, who knew how much extremely 
fine material is needed for a single one. 
However, it was known that German sub- 
marine commanders were extremely care- 
ful to conserve torpedo supply. Extraor- 
dinarily strict regulations governed their 
use. It is understood that every com- 
mander had to account in detail for each 
torpedo, being held strictly accountable 
for wasted missiles. 

Q. — Did the American patrol force 
them to expend more torpe- 
does? 

A. — If the American patrol did not 
force them actually to use more torpe- 
does, it certainly made them waste more, 
because it forced them to fire a larger 
number at long range, thus wasting many, 
because they registered no hits. 

Q. — How did the patrols force this 
condition? 

A. — Partly by convoying ships, so that 
the submarines could not approach within 
easy torpedoing distance without the im- 
minent risk of having a destroyer on top 
of them, as their periscopes arose above 
the surface for a sight at the prey. 
Partly by so covering the sea in extended 
patrol that the submarine had few chances 
to chase ships and destroy them by shell- 
fire from the surface, because the wire- 
less call for help would bring destroyers 
to the scene. 

Q. — How many torpedoes could 
German submarines carry? 

A. — A minimum of four on the small, 
old-type submarines. A maximum of 
twelve on the big super-submarines per- 
fected during the war. The U-53, which 
visited Newport and then sank Allied 
ships off Nantucket, carried ten. It was 
said in 1918 that the Germans had insti- 
tuted the manufacture of two types of 
torpedoes — one the full-charge, highly 
perfected, long-range torpedo, which costs 
a great deal; the other a greatly cheap- 
ened torpedo, which was limited to 500 
or 600 yards' range, but was quite ef- 
fective within that range. 

Q. — Was the Deutschland a war- 
ship? 

A. — No. She was a submarine mer- 
chantman, the first one in the world. She 



62 



Questions and Answers 



was unarmed. The Deutschland was 
about 300 feet long, and carried a cargo 
of 800 tons. In 1916 she twice sailed 
from Germany to the United States and 
returned. Each crossing of the Atlantic 
took from 16 to 22 days, and each time 
she ran the British blockade successfully. 
The German cargo consisted chiefly of 
dyestuffs. The American return cargo 
was rubber and nickel. No other such 
vessel ever reached an American port, 
although the sailing of a companion ves- 
sel, the Bremen, was reported. 



Q. — Do submarines move under 
water with gasolene power? 

A. — No. The gasolene engines can 
work under water only with great diffi- 
culty. Apart from the combustion of the 
limited supply of air in a submerged sub- 
marine, the exhausts cannot operate suf- 
ficiently against the great water pressure 
below the surface. Besides this, the ex- 
haust would send an unceasing stream of 
bubbles to the surface, and .thus betray 
the exact whereabouts of the submarine 
to its foes. 



Q. — What power do submarines 
use under water? 

A. — Power from electric storage bat- 
teries. Whenever the submarine can lie 
on the surface, its gasolene engines are 
operated at top speed, to generate elec- 
tricity for charging these batteries. In 
dangerous waters this is often done at 
night. The storage batteries can store 
enough power so that a submarine can, 
if necessary, run submerged for about 24 
hours without needing to come to the 
surface. Such long runs, however, are 
rarely required. 



ward. It is a very delicate operation, for 
the engines must work with great force, 
and any undue operation of the diving- 
rudders may send the vessel down bow 
first, plunging it to a dangerous depth, 
and even turning it end over end. 

Q. — Can you give a brief sum- 
mary of submarine warfare 
questions? 

A. — (1) December 24, 1914. Admiral 
von Tirpitz throws out hints in a news- 
paper interview of a wholesale torpedo- 
ing policy. (2) February 4, 1915. Ger- 
man Government proclaims a war zone 
about the British Isles, and her intention 
to sink any enemy merchantman encoun- 
tered in this zone without warning. (3) 
May 1 (dated April 22), 1915. Although 
our people had an absolute and perfect 
right to sail, the German Embassy pub- 
lished an advertisement in New York 
morning newspapers, warning them not 
to do so. The Lusitania sailed at 
12.20 noon, May 1, and was sunk without 
warning on May 7. (4) August 19, 1915. 
Sinking of the Arabic, whereupon von 
Bernstorff gave an oral pledge for his 
government that hereafter German sub- 
marines would not sink "liners" without 
warning. (5) March 24, 1916. Sinking 
of the Sussex, passenger vessel, with Am- 
ericans on board. (6) May 4, 1916. Ger- 
many, in response to the threat of the 
United States Government to break off 
diplomatic relations with her, gives her 
"Sussex pledge." (7) January 31, 1917. 
Germany notifies our government that she 
will begin "unrestricted submarine war" 
on the following day. (8) February 3, 
1917. The President gives Count Bern- 
storff his passports and recalls Ambas- 
sador Gerard from Berlin. (9) April 6, 
1917. American declaration of a state of 
war. 



Q. — How does a submarine sub- 
merge? 

A. — Partly by taking water into its bal- 
last tanks, and partly by diving. It can 
submerge by taking in water only, but 
then it simply sinks slowly to an awash 
condition. It cannot take too much water 
in, for it would lose its buoyancy and 
continue to sink till it got to the bottom. 

Therefore, as soon as it has enough 
water-weight on board to bring it awash, 
the engines are started, and, at the same 
time, the forward diving-rudders or fins 
are so set that as the submarine is pro- 
pelled forward, its bow is forced down- / 

1 



Q. — What are sound detectors? 

A. — They are sound-receiving devices in 
the nature of microphones, to detect ves- 
sels by hearing the hum of motors and 
noise of other machinery. They have 
been wonderfully developed and it was 
possible by 1918 not only to identify the 
nature of the vessel but to tell with very 
considerable exactness the direction from 
which she was approaching, her distance 
from the observer, her speed, etc. An 
"oscillator" and improved sound detector 
made it possible to carry on actual wire- 
less conversations under water at shorter 
or longer distances. 



Man Under Water (The Submarine) 



63 



Q. — What are ballast tanks? 

A. — They are tanks that can be pumped 
full of water so that the submarine will 
submerge. If the vessel wants to rise, the 
water is blown out by compressed air 
pumps. These must be immensely power- 
ful, because under the surface the out- 
side pressure of the water is enormous at 
any considerable depths and the pumps 
must be able to overcome it. 

Q. — How much water must fee in 
the tanks to help submersion? 

A. — A submarine of, say 500 tons, 
would need to take in about 125 tons of 
water in order to submerge. This water 
is admitted through valves. 



to the sea-bottom and then floated to the 
required height is exceedingly ingenious. 
According to Italian reports, the Germans 
have used a very rough sort of subma- 
rine for mine-laying in the Adriatic, but 
those captured by the British were appar- 
ently very efficient craft. 

Q. — What is a submarine mine? 

A. — It is a weapon used principally to 
defend the approaches to harbors and 
anchorages. There are two main varie- 
ties — those under direct control from the 
shore, and those not under control. The 
former are exploded by electricity from a 
station on land; the latter are mechanical 
and explode when struck by a passing 
vessel. 



Q —Where are the ballast tanks? Q.— How big is a submarine mine? 



A. — They are within the main hull and 
the superstructure. 

Q. — How quickly can they be 
filled? 

A. — At -the rate of more than 50 tons 
a minute. 

Q. — What are a submarine's hy- 
droplanes? 

A. — They are fins or vanes that extend 
along both sides. They can be "set" 
from within at any desired angle. By 
setting them so that they incline down- 
ward with their forward parts, they force 
the submarine's bow down and thus make 
it dive. By setting them to incline upward 
the submarine is made to rise. The fins 
can be set to maintain the vessel in any 
desired position. They are so efficient 
for their purpose that submarines can make 
runs under water for hours without vary- 
ing their depth more than a few feet. 

Q. — Had the Germans many mine- 
laying submarines? 

A. — They appear to have a large num- 
ber, and some have been captured. They 
have specially constructed air-tight cham- 
bers into which the mines are placed 
ready to be sown. These mines are some- 
what smaller than those hitherto used, but 
are deadly nevertheless. When the sub- 
marine has reached the desired spot, the 
chamber is flooded with water and the 
mines are ejected by mechanical means. 
The method by which they are anchored 



A. — Submarine mines are usually cylin- 
drical in shape, some four feet in diam- 
eter. They are not made larger owing to 
difficulty of handling, and are quite large 
enough to contain a charge sufficient to 
sink great ships. 

Q. — Do these mines float about or 
are they attached? 

A. — Most of them are anchored, but 
floating mines are also sown, and drift 
about to the danger of all shipping. The 
anchored ones usually lie some six feet 
below the surface. Many are made so 
that when they break away from their 
moorings they become innocuous. A spe- 
cial contrivance prevents the mine being 
fired whilst it is being laid; in fact _ it 
does not become dangerous for some min- 
utes after it has been put into the sea. 

Q. — How can these mines be dis- 
covered? 

A. — Trawlers are used to discover and 
catch them. The British make use of the 
steam drifters (fishermen) of the North 
Sea for this purpose. The method is for 
four or five of them to steam abreast, 
sweeping the sea behind them with long 
hawsers and grappling apparatus. In 
this way all trade routes and chan- 
nels can be got quickly rid of mines. The 
trawlers themselves are of light enough 
draft to pass above them. Special appli- 
ances are used for this dangerous trawl- 
ing. The North Sea fishermen know the 
set of the currents, the channels and 
shoals, so are obviously the best men to 
send after mines which drift with the 
current. 



64 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What is a torpedo mine? 

A. — It is a contrivance somewhat like 
a torpedo tube, loaded with a special form 
of mine, imbedded in the bottom of the 
channel. No mine sweepers can reach 
it, for it is buried in the bed itself. It is 
fired by electricity from the shore when 
a ship passes over it. This invention is 
used to defend harbors and straits. 



Q. — What German submarine op- 
erated off the American coast 
before we entered the war? 

A. — The U-53, a very modern vessel, 
which made a sudden appearance in New- 
port harbor, greatly to the excitement of 
all America. It arrived in the Rhode 
Island harbor on October 8, 1916, with 
letters for the German ambassador, and 
soon put to sea again. The next thing 
the American public learned was through 
big headlines saying that the U-53 was 
sinking ships off Nantucket. Among the 
five or six vessels sunk was the steamer 
Stephano, which carried American pas- 
sengers. The passengers and crews of all 
the vessels were picked up by United 
States destroyers, and no lives were lost. 

The importance of the matter, in the 
American view, was the possibility that 
this one submarine was the precursor of 
more and that it might lead' to operations 
off the American coast. This would un- 
doubtedly have made a highly critical 
condition. However, the U-53 disappear- 
ed again and no similar visit occurred 
during our neutrality. 



Q. — Can a submarine send wireless 
without high masts? 

A. — Yes. Of course the lack of high 
masts limits its radius, but submarines 
can do very well, indeed. The German 
submarines were thoroughly fitted with 
wireless in the very beginning of the 
war. Indeed, without wireless they 
would have been pretty helpless — unable 
to get in touch with any other submarine 
and quite unable to learn anything, ex- 
cept what they could see. But, fitted as 
they were, they could keep themselves 
and their fellow-raiders so well informed 
that they managed to warn each other 
quite successfully of dangers, and they 
succeeded in operating in unison more or 
less, besides picking up a good deal of 
the enemy wireless. 



Q. — Did German submarines need 
no masts at all for wireless? 

A. — Oh, yes. They had to have masts, 
and they had them. The wireless masts 
were folding or telescopic that could be 
elevated about twenty feet, and this gave 
them a radius of from 125 to perhaps 
200 miles — the minimum distance being 
in the day time when conditions were 
poor, and the maximum being at night 
when conditions are unusually good. 
The average wireless range of the early 
boats probably would be about 150 miles. 

Q. — Can German submarines com- 
municate with the German ad- 
miralty? 

A. — They did so even in the early days 
when they did not carry wireless as pow- 
erful as the equipment in the very new 
types. When the British battleship For- 
midable was sunk by one of them in the 
North Sea on New Year's Day, 1915, the 
German Admiralty gave out the news al- 
most as quickly as it was known to the 
British Admiralty. The submarine had 
wirelessed her news into the air, and other 
German submarines had caught it, and 
relayed it on and on till it reached one 
that could, in turn, reach Germany. 

Q. — Have the Germans greatly per- 
fected wireless on submarines? 

A. — It has been reported, with much 
circumstantial detail, that the Germans 
have pitchecj on a very simple and effec- 
tive device for elevating the wireless an- 
tennae from their submarines to great 
heights, and thus extending their wire- 
less radius to as much as 1,000 miles. The 
device is said to be simply a couple of 
small balloons that are sent up with the 
wire attached to them. Under favorable 
conditions they may go as high as 2,000 
feet. This method could be used with 
comparative ease at night when the sub- 
marines could venture to lie motionless 
on the surface. 

Q. — How many different ways can 
a submarine operate? 

A. — In four ways: (1) running light, 
that is, wholly on the surface like any 
other vessel; (2) awash, that is, just suf- 
ficiently sunk to submerge her hull but 
leave her conning tower and bridge above 
the surface so that her captain can com- 
mand her from the surface ; (3) surface- 
submerged, that is, totally under water, 
but so close to the surface that her crew 
can see the world through their periscope ; 



Man Under Water (The Submarine) 



65 



(4) submerged, when the periscope is 
useless and the navigation must be done 
entirely by calculation. 

Q. — Why does oil on the surface in- 
dicate that a submarine has 
been sunk? 

A. — It does not, necessarily. There 
have been many newspaper statements 
that a rammed submarine was known to 
have been destroyed because large patches 
of oil were seen on the surface after the 
ramming. As a matter of fact, however, 
oil rising to the surface simply indicates 
that there has been an injury to one of 
the fuel-oil supply tanks, which are sit- 
uated in the outer skin of German sub- 
marines. The actual hull of the sub- 
marine is inside of these. A smashed 
oil-tank would, of course, injure the 
under-water boat considerably, but it 
does not destroy her, nor prevent her 
from voyaging to her base for repairs. 
A more certain indication of fatal dam- 
age to a submarine would be the vast 
rush of air that must spout from her 
compressed air-tanks if she is really in- 
jured badly. This would mount to the 
surface in a perfect maelstrom of froth- 
ing bubbles. 

Q. — How quickly can a submarine's 
guns be housed? 

A. — In from twenty to thirty seconds. 
The Krupp rapid-fire 3-inch guns with 
which German submarines are armed, are 
so mounted that by the pull of a single 
lever they will turn over backward on an 
axle and lie snugly upside down in the 
well, which is then closed with a water- 
tight, hinged cover. The time for the 
whole operation is 20 seconds. Some of 
the very latest types have, in addition to 
these collapsible guns, smaller deck guns, 
which do not need housing at all, because 
they are made of metals impervious to 
salt-water. 

Q. — Can submarines escape a storm 
by sinking below the surface? 

A. — They need only sink about thirty 
feet to escape nearly every sense of mo- 
tion from an ordinarily rough surface 
sea. If the gale is very violent, there 
may be some motion as far as forty-five 
f~et below the surface, but at fifty feet 
the water usually is still as death. This 
is in deep ocean water. In the shallow 
North Sea and the Baltic, the ground- 
swells often make a pumping motion that 
is noticeable forty feet deep, and sub- 



marines must be handled cautiously when 
submerged, for fear of being unexpect- 
edly pounded against the bottom. 

Q. — How quickly can a submarine 
submerge? 

A. — A submarine that is cruising awash, 
and all cleared for quick action, can shut 
her water-tight hatches and sink out of 
sight in less than three minutes. In or- 
dinary times, the period that has to elapse 
between running light on the surface with 
hatches open and gear exposed, to the 
moment of total submersion is about 
eight minutes with ordinary speed of 
crew-work. 

Q. — How deep can a submarine 
go? 

A. — If it were not for water-pressure, 
a submarine could go to the bottom of 
the deepest oceanic abyss in the world 
with absolutely no trouble. But water- 
pressure is a tremendous thing. At 200 
feet the pressure on a man is the same 
as if he were under a load of 13 tons. 
To withstand such pressures a submarine 
must be of extremely strong construc- 
tion. Any leak, however slight, might 
fill her with enough water to overcome 
her reserve buoyancy ; and then she would 
sink rapidly to depths that will simply 
crush anything made of man. Therefore 
submarines rarely venture lower than 100 
feet, and the usual cruising depth is thirty 
or fifty feet. American submarines are 
built by the Navy to withstand test at 200 
feet, and they have navigated at greater 
depths, but only for a "stunt." 

Q. — What American submarine 
was lost by sinking too deep? 

A. — The F 4. She was cruising sub- 
merged off Honolulu Harbor (Hawaaian 
Islands), and sank in 250 feet of water. 
American naval divers performed extraor- 
dinary exploits in trying to reach her, 
and, in the end, despite the terrific water- 
pressure, succeeded in attaching cables so 
that she could be raised and dragged 
ashore. Her entire crew, however, was 
lost, for she was not raised for many 
days after the accident. 

Q. — How far can a submarine pilot 
see through the periscope? 

A. — On a clear day, with his periscope 
sticking fifteen feet above the surface, he 
can see such an object as a battleship five 
miles away. With the periscope only 



66 



Questions and Answers 



just showing above the surface, he can 
see a ship a little more than a mile away. 

Q. — How can a man find his way 
under water? 

A. — The answer is: how does a sailor 
find his way on top of the water? All 
he can see is water and sky. The sun 
will tell him where east, west, north and 
south are, but that is all. The sailor on 
the surface steers not by sight (except, 
of course, to avoid some other ship), but 
by chart and compass. In fog or black 
nights his eyes are of no more use than 
if he were under water. The submarine 
captain steers similarly — by chart and 
compass. 

Q. — Can a submarine be steered as 
easily under water as a ship on 
the surface? 

A. — Just as easily. The rudder acts in 
just the same way. In fact, a ship run- 
ning on the surface in a sea-way or in 
a high wind is much harder to steer than 
a submerged submarine which has no 
waves to disturb it. 



Q. — How does a submarine com- 
mander know how deep under 
water he is ? 

A. — He simply looks at an indicator, 
which is worked by water pressure. The 
pressure of water increases at a certain 
positive and accurately known ratio 
with every bit of depth. The submarine 
commander can tell his depth to the foot 
— to the inch if he wants to be so accu- 
rate. 

Q. — Did our destroyers capture any 
German submarines? 
A. — The American destroyers Fanning 
and Nicholson sighted a periscope while 
escorting a convoy. They dropped deptii 
charges where the submarine had sub- 
merged, and in a few minutes she came 
up bow first. For a moment she was 
down by the stern, but she righted her- 
self and seemed to be speeding up, so 
the Fanning fired three shots at her. The 
submarine crew then came on deck and 
held up their hands in token of surren- 
der. The destroyers got a line to her, but 
she sank in a few minutes. The submarine 



crew jumped into the water, and was 
picked up by the destroyers. 

Q. — When did enemy submarines 
first appear on the American 
coast? 

A. — The first demonstration was on 
May 25, 1918, when 3 American schooners 
were sunk in the Atlantic off the Virginia 
Capes. On June 2 four schooners and two 
steamships were sunk. The scope of op- 
erations gradually extended itself, till the 
record of sinkings ran from Cape Hat- 
teras to the Bay of Fundy. On August 11 
eleven small American schooners were 
sunk off Cape Hatteras. 

Q. — Did the Germans get any big 
ships on our coast? 

A. — Up to October, 1918, they had 
not succeeded in harming any transports 
with troops or similar important vessels, 
except the cruiser San Diego, which was 
sunk by external agency off Fire Island 
near New York City, most probably by a 
mine laid by submarine. The Diamond 
Shoals Lightship (off Cape Hatteras) was 
torpedoed August 7. An American tank 
steamship, the Henry S. Kellogg, was sunk 
30 miles off the entrance to New York 
harbor on Aug. 13. 

Q. — How many vessels were sunk 
altogether? 

A. — Up to August 13, 1018, about 19 
steamships, 26 schooners and enough other 
vessels (sailing vessels, tugs, etc.) to bring 
the total to 56 had been sunk. Only a few 
were over 5,000 tons. Most were under 
500 tons, and many were not much over 
100 tons. The fishing fleets of New Eng- 
land and Canada were the heaviest suf- 
ferers during August. 

Q. — How many German subma- 
rines have been destroyed? 

A. — No official figures had been issued 
up to September 1, 1918, but on August 
19 newspaper dispatches stated that the 
number destroyed during the war had 
passed the 200 mark and that the German 
Admiralty had remaining in commission 
between 160 and 180. In the beginning of 
the war there were said to be 150 German 
submarines in commission. (No authority 
was named for these figures in the dis- 
patch.) 



MAN IN THE AIR 



Q. — How many airplanes have we? 

A.— It is impossible for military reasons 
to give exact figures. On August 30, 1918, 
General March, Chief of Staff of the 
United States Army, told the Senate Com- 
mittee on Military Affairs that more than 
1,000 DeHaviland airplanes had been com- 
pleted or were in readiness to be turned 
over to the Government. Before that the 
following figures of production up to 
June 8, 1918, had been given out: deliv- 
eries of elementary training planes 4,495; 
advanced training planes 820; combat 
planes 286; elementary training engines 
6,88o; advanced training engines 2,133; 
Liberty engines, over 2,000; aircraft ma- 
chine guns 37.250. 

Q. — What is the American bomD- 

ing plane? 

A. — One is a new huge machine known 
as the Handley-Page, with two Liberty 
motors, 400 horsepower each. This has a 
wing-spread of 100 feet, and its fuselage 
(body) is 63 feet long. It is capable of 
making 100 miles an hour, carrying 20 
men, if necessary, together with bombs 
weighing 9,000 pounds, and two Browning 
machine guns. Its test flight was made on 
July 6, 1918. In September we tested out 
a monster Caproni, with 3 Liberty motors, 
1,200 horsepower. 

Q. — How many air fighters have we 
in France? 

A.— Major-General William L. Kenly, 
Chief of Military Aeronautics, said before 
the Senate Committee on Military Affairs 
on August 24, 1918, that we then had 
3,000 air pilots in France. By far the 
larger number of these was using foreign 
machines. 

Q. — Who was in charge of Ameri- 
can aircraft? 

A.— The army aircraft service was 
placed in charge of John D. Ryan, a well- 
known American financier and mine- 
owner. In August, 1918, after he had been 
at the general head of aircraft affairs, he 
was appointed second assistant secretary 
of war with new and sweeping powers 
that practically centered all responsibility 
and control in him. Besides this army 
service there were the aircraft divisions 
of the Navy and the U. S. Marines Corps 



Q. — Does the term "ace" mean a 
man or a flying machine? 

A. — It means a man — a man nearest to 
the knight of old wars, who fought bat- 
tles with other knights while the armies 
looked on, waiting to see which champion 
should conquer. 

The "ace" is a fighting air-man whose 
skill and daring make him a veritable 
champion of the twentieth century war. 
Mounted in the swiftest machines that 
science can turn out, the ace flies forth 
to attack the hostile lines in every way 
possible. Many times in this war a cele- 
brated ace has fought from two to a 
dozen hostile machines and has not only 
escaped, but has actually made havoc 
among his assailants so that, sometimes, 
Have as they were, they had to yield to 
superior skill and resourcefulness, _ and 
retired, defeated and baffled, often with a 
humiliating list of killed. 

Q. — What is the record of the aces? 

A. — The famous aces of the war up to 
1918 were: about 60 French, about 40 
British, about 65 Germans, and about 60 
Italian, Belgian, American (with Lafay- 
ette Escadrille), Russian, Bulgar and 
Turks. Bulgars and Turks had only one 
each. 

The ten Italians are credited with more 
than 120 victories, and were said to be 
all still living at the end of autumn, 1917-' 

Of the French, about fifteen were killed 
after winning about 170 victories. Thirty- 
seven German aces were killed or cap- 
tured after 589 victories. The one Bul- 
gar was killed after 20 victories. The 
one Turk was said to be still living in 
February, 1918, after 8 victories. 

The American Lafayette Escadrille rec- 
ord was, as given in the Outlook early in 
1918: living, 12 with 35 victories; dead, 
3 with 10 victories. 

The 33 British aces, of whom 3 are 
known to have been killed, have 400 vic- 
tories to their credit. There are more 
brilliant British airmen than these fig- 
ures indicate. Great Britain, for some 
reason, does not make it a regular busi- 
ness to give details. 

Q. — When was Major Lufberry 
killed? 
A. — Major Raoul Lufberry was killed 



67 



68 



Questions and Answers 



near Toul on May 18, 1918, after almost 
three years of brilliant air-service. He 
was an American of Wallingford, Conn., 
and had become commander of the famous 
Lafayette Escadrille. As an ace he had 
a record of bringing down almost 20 Ger- 
man machines. 

Q. — What was the record of Guy- 
nemer, the famous French ace? 

A. — Fifty-four aeroplanes put out of 
commission, 215 combats and two wounds. 
On one occasion he succeeded in bringing 
down three enemy aeroplanes in jess than 
an hour. He finally fell himself in a bat- 
tle with 40 aeroplanes of the enemy after 
having brought down one of the forty. 

Q. — Is there a new German super- 
dreadnaught flying machine? 

A. — It has been reported with circum- 
stantial detail that the Germans are build- 
ing a monster which they call the 
"Riesen-flugzeug," meaning literally 
"Giant Flying Apparatus." The details 
as given are that this monster is a bi- 
plane with four engines placed two 
abreast, one set driving a pusher propeller 
(in the back) and the other driving a 
tractor propeller (in front). 

The carrying capacity in bombs alone is 
said to be more than a ton, — three bombs 
of a thousand pounds each, — enough to 
wreak terrific destruction. 

The biplanes, according to these re- 
ports, are to be bombers exclusively, with 
platforms carrying a sufficiently large 
crew of machine and rapid-fire gunners to 
fight off any possible attack. 

Q. — Where can the Germans get 
airship material? 

A. — According to a report from Wash- 
ington (printed with a suggestion that it 
was official, but not positively saying so) 
some captured German airplanes had been 
brought to this country and examined 
carefully by our experts early in 1918; 
and this examination showed that the 
Germans were very hard put to it indeed 
for material. The most noticeable short- 
age was in spruce and linen for the wings. 

The wing beams, instead of being of 
solid pieces of the finest and toughest 
spruce, as is demanded in American speci- 
fications, were made of thin pieces jointed 
with naiis and glue. The wings were cov- 
ered with fiber cloth instead of the thor- 
oughly well-woven linen that is demanded 
in a perfect machine. 



Q. — Is a special bullet used against 
aeroplanes ? 

A. — Yes. It is another development of 
this war. It has been found that the bullet 
needed against flying craft must be ca- 
pable of piercing armor in the first place, 
and that it must have some property 
that shall cause more damage than a 
mere hole, which rarely cripples an aero- 
plane. 

The United States Army Ordnance 
Department has turned out a bullet of 
the regulation American army rifle caliber 
that will not only pierce the armor of 
flying craft, but will produce a flame as 
it leaves the rifle or machine gun. This 
flame serves as a "tracer," thus enabling 
the gunner to gauge his shots and correct 
his aim till he hits the mark. By day the 
fiery compound leaves a hanging smoke 
to serve as "tracer." When the fiery bullet 
hits, it goes through the armor and sets 
fire along its whole line of flight. The 
object particularly is to explode the flying 
machine's gasoline tanks. 



Q. — Did Allied aviators decorate 
graves of German airmen? 

A. — Yes. At the funerals of Boelcke 
and Immelmann, German military aviators 
in Belgium, British aviators flew over and 
dropped wreaths. 

It is one cheering fact in the war that 
the aviators of both sides performed this 
chivalrous act more than once. 



Q. — Does war destroy many aero- 
planes? 

A. — The French authorities reported in 
1917 that in one period of four months 
they had brought down 73 German ma- 
chines inside of French lines. They cal- 
culated that 188 had gone down behind 
the German lines, and of these they 
thought enough had been so badly shat- 
tered to justify the claim that at least 231 
had been destroyed in those four months. 



Q. — How big is the British naval 
air-service? 

A. — It was 700 before the war and by 
1918 had increased to 41,000. The United 
Service Gazette (British) said in 1918: 
"During one month the aircraft patrol 
around the British coast alone is five 
times the circumference of the earth. 



Man in the Air 



69 



During September (1Q17) 64 raids were 
made on enemy dockyards, etc., and 2,736 
bombs were dropped, totaling 85 tons of 
explosive." 

Q. — At the beginning of war, how 
many aircraft were there? 

A. — France had 22 dirigibles and 1,400 
aeroplanes ; Russia had 18 dirigibles and 
800 aeroplanes ; Great Britain, 9 dirigibles 
and 400 aeroplanes ; Belgium, 2 dirigibles 
and 100 aeroplanes ; Germany, 40 dirigi- 
bles and 1,000 aeroplanes; Austria, 8 
dirigibles and 400 aeroplanes ; while the 
United States had only 23 aeroplanes, 
mostly obsolete. 

Q. — What was Germany's air 
strength later in the war? 

A. — It is estimated by the French that 
the German air fleet at the beginning of 
1918 numbered about 300 squadrillas, or a 
total of 2,500 machines, each squadrilla 
being comprised of from five to ten ma- 
chines. 

Q. — What is the difference between 
an airship and an aeroplane? 

A. — An airship is lighter than air ; that 
is to say, it mounts because it is filled 
with a buoyant gas. An aeroplane is 
heavier than air; it carries no gas to lift 
it, but mounts by forcing its wings 
against the air. Consequently it must al- 
ways keep moving at a fairly high speed. 

Q. — What keeps an aeroplane in 
the air? 

A. — Its motion, or speed, developed 
constantly by an engine. If the engine 
stops, the forward motion ceases and the 
aeroplane falls. By volplaning, or coast- 
ing, the aviator can often establish a for- 
ward-downward course and check the fall. 

Q. — Are there many varieties o£ 
aeroplanes ? 

A. — Several ; but all are based upon the 
same type. An Australian (Mr. Har- 
greaves) may be said to be the man who 
made the aeroplane possible. He invented 
the box kite, and an aeroplane is just a 
box kite, with a powerful engine and pro- 
peller that, in a measure, may be said to 
take the place of the string. Aeroplanes 
fall into two main classes — monoplanes 
and biplanes. The former have one 
plane only, the latter two. 



Q. — Has the aeroplane much influ- 
ence in war? 

A. — It has revolutionized warfare, espe- 
cially by making surprise attacks almost 
impossible. In maneuvers it has again 
and again brought opposing forces to an 
absolute deadlock, and in this war it has 
enabled both the Allies and the Germans 
to counter nearly every attack. In the 
old days, a commander had to rely 
largely upon his intuition and knowledge 
of war; he had to risk regiments to ascer- 
tain the actual position of his foe, and 
waste days making feigned attacks all 
along the line, until he discovered the 
weak spot. Now the aeroplane scout tells 
him what he wants to know, often in a 
few minutes. As Lord French said, we 
now have to play the game of war with 
all the cards on the table. 

Q. — What is a seaplane? 

A. — It is an aeroplane fitted with floats, 
which enable it to rest on the water. 
Great Britain has devoted special atten- 
tion to this type of machine, and has more 
of them than any other Power. These 
planes can fly from the deck of a war- 
ship. When they return they alight on 
the water, and are hauled aboard. The 
Americans have perfected an aerial 
hydro-aeroplane, a light boat, with wings. 
The British seaplane is a powerful ma- 
chine, but it cannot ascend so rapidly, or 
to such very great heights as the other 
types of aeroplanes. 

Q. — Are there many types of air- 
ships? 

A. — A good many. The most efficient 
of all is the Zeppelin. This is what is 
called the rigid type ; somewhat similar is 
the Suchette Lanz. The Parseval is a 
semi-rigid airship, used principally for 
scouting, although it can drop bombs if 
required. Similar to it are the Astra- 
Torres, the Clement-Bayard, the Lebaudy, 
and the Gross. There are also little dirig- 
ibles, of the type of the Alpha, Beta and 
Gamma British army airships, which ap- 
pear to be of minor use. 

Q. — What is the cost of a Zeppe- 
lin? 

A. — It is not known definitely. Count 
Zeppelin sold an early one to the German 
Government for $125,000. Great Britain 
bought a semi-rigid Astra-Torres, in 1913, 
for £18,000 ($90,000). 



7o 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What is the difference between 
a Zeppelin and a Parseval? 

A. — Put simply, the difference between 
the two is that the first is a rigid frame- 
work of aluminum and light steel, into 
which a large number of separate gas bags 
are put. The second is a large gas bag, 
from which a car is suspended. In the 
rigid type cabins and platforms are firmly 
attached to the framework, within which 
gas bags are stowed ; several of the latter 
might be punctured and lose their gas 
without the airship falling. In the non- 
rigid type the car is suspended by wire 
ropes, and hangs beneath the gas enve- 
lope. If this is punctured seriously the 
whole affair collapses at once. 

Q. — Could Zeppelins cross the sea 
to bomb American cities? 

A. — That has been said very often, but 
it must be remarked that there is a great 
mass of very powerful technical factors 
against the assumption. The cruising ra- 
dius of a Zeppelin is very great, or can 
be made very great, but a trip across the 
Atlantic, it must be remembered, also 
involves a trip back again. 

If a great effect were planned, it might 
be assumed that the Germans would try 
it, and that possibly they would succeed. 
But a single raid by a single Zeppelin, 
even if successful, would not be an effect 
commensurate with the effort expended. 
To produce real havoc, a whole fleet 
would be needed. This would, of course, 
multiply the risks of the adventure ex- 
ceedingly and it is hardly possible that 
the fleet should escape without very 
severe losses. 

The cruising radius of the Zeppelins in 
service in 1914 was known to be 3,000 
miles maximum. 

Q. — Could Zeppelins ride out a gale 
over the Atlantic? 

A. — They would not have to do so. 
They would probably merely need to rise 
to higher levels in the air until they were 
above the storm. Storms are all of lim- 
ited extent — that is, they may seem pretty 
unlimited to the human beings caught in 
them, but geographically they rarely 
cover a very big area; and, as far as 
height is concerned, they may be very 
limited indeed. People in mountain 
countries know this. Th^ey often find that 
a climb of much less than a thousand 
,feet will bring them into a dead calm 
whereas just below them a veritable tem- 
pest may be beating the tree-tops. 



Q. — What was the reason for the 
great Zeppelin disaster of 
1917? 

A. — The Zeppelin fleet which drifted 
helplessly over France, with the result 
that a number were brought down, is 
said to have suffered from frozen en- 
gines. The big airships had risen to enor- 
mous altitudes to prevent observation or 
attack by aeroplanes, and the intense cold 
completely froze up their motors, accord- 
ing to report. 

Q. — Did a very large Zeppelin come 
down in France? 

A. — One Zeppelin, L-49, which came 
down at Dammartin, was fully as long 
as an average ocean steamship. It meas- 
ured 643 feet and had about as much 
"beam" as most ships of that size, for 
its diameter was about one-sixth of its 
length, which would make it all of a hun- 
dred feet wide at its widest part — truly a 
monstrous thing to ride the solitudes of 
air! 

It carried a large quantity of fuel oil 
for its motors, of which there were five, 
each able to produce 240 horsepower. 

Q. — How much gas could the L-49 
carry? 

A. — According to the French examiners 
and experts, this type carried 18 gas-bag 
reservoirs within the metal skeleton of 
the hull, and the quantity was 55,000 cubic 
meters of hydrogen gas, enough to lift 
the twelve-ton ship with all its additional 
tons of weight in the form of supplies, 
bombs, etc. 

This Zeppelin carried a crew of about 
20 men and was armed like a naval vessel, 
with machine guns and automatic guns 
for use against aeroplanes, etc. 

Q. — Why did the L-49 have five 
motors ? 

A. — Two of them were used purely 
as auxiliary motors, or, rather, as emer- 
gency motors. They were rarely operat- 
ed, but were in effect spare motors in 
case of accident. 

Q. — What is meant by the "roof" 
of a Zeppelin? 

A. — It is technical slang for altitude- 
rising ability. When an aerial expert 
says that the "roof" of such and such an 
airship is 4,000 feet, he means that it can 
rise 4,000 feet into the air at most. 

The "roof" of the original Zeppelins 



Man in the Air 



7i 



was probably about a mile. After the 
war began, we found that Zeppelins had 
gained ability and could navigate up to 
6,000 feet and more. It is said now that 
the very latest type of this rigid airship 
can rise and remain under control in 
heights ranging from 15,000 to 20,000 
feet above the surface of the earth. 

Q. — Why cannot every airship rise 
to such heights? 

A. — Because of the meteorological con- 
ditions. The highly rarefied air at such 
altitudes makes two immense difficulties : 
(1) The air being thinner and lighter, the 
airship (whether gas-lifted or engine- 
lifted) has far less support than it has in 
the dense air nearer the surface of earth. 
In other words, it becomes heavier with 
every foot of ascension into these rarefied 
regions of silence. Even the propellers 
lose thrust heavily. All the conditions 
are severe. The flying machine labors 
like the men in it, whose lungs and hearts 
and blood-vessels are all strained. (2) 
The immense rarefaction and the intense 
cold combine to destroy all the equilib- 
rium of the motor, which is an engine 
built for a certain range of pressures. 

Q. — Is the Zeppelin really a fail- 
ure? 

A. — It has failed as a fighting machine 
because the aeroplane, with its superior 
mobility, has proved a deadly enemy. As 
a terror-inspiring war weapon, it has 
failed even more signally. By bombing 
unfortified towns and otherwise heart- 
lessly attacking helpless civilian popula- 
tions with it, the Germans have not only 
turned all nations against themselves, but 
actually intensified the spirit of inexor- 
able resistance and war to a victory 
among their opponents. 

Zeppelins have remained valuable as 
mobile scouts and watchers. Thus they 
have been highly effective in watching 
the North Sea. Cruising high beyond 
reach, and able to maintain their stations 
for days and nights at a time, they have 
made a guarding fleet that has given the 
German navy much additional security. 
Motor-lifted aeroplanes could not possi- 
bly do it as well. 

Q. — Why has there been so little 
progress in developing the 
dirigible airship? 

A. — The chief difficulty — that of over- 
coming the effect of varying temperatures 



— remained long unsolved. The rays of 
the sun, appearing suddenly on a cloudy 
day or growing warmer with the approach 
of noon, would expand the gas, send the 
airship to higher altitudes, and possibly 
burst the bag. Disappearance of the sun 
or the approach of night would contract 
the gas and cause the airship to descend. 

Q. — How did Count Zeppelin over- 
come this? 

A. — He covered his gas bag (or bags, 
there being as many as eighteen in later 
models) with an outer envelope held rigid 
by a framework of aluminum, thus keep- 
ing the sun's rays from the gas bag. 

Q. — Where does the crew of a Zep- 
pelin sleep? 

A. — Within the framework is a long 
passageway for the crew, a mere board- 
walk nine inches wide composed of 
wooden slats separated one from another 
by several inches. Along this passage- 
way hangs a series of hammocks. This is 
where the crew is quartered. 

Q. — What color is a Zeppelin? 

A. — The under half is painted a coal 
black to make it invisible at night, the 
upper surface of the hull is painted 
white and gray to make it blend with a 
cloud so as to make it difficult to be seen 
from an aeroplane. 

Q. — What is the speed of a Zeppe- 
lin? 

A. — The speed of the present Zeppelin 
is never less than 60 miles an hour and 
may be developed as high as 100 miles 
an hour. Speed saves the Zeppelin from 
destruction in a gale. Speed has been 
obtained by trebling the size of a Zep- 
pelin and by applying the lessons learned 
in developing the 130-mile-an-hour fight- 
ing aeroplane. 

Q. — When was the first Zeppelin 
raid made over England? 

A. — Zeppelins flew over the British 
Isles for the first time on January i9, 
1915. Nine bombs were thrown at Yar- 
mouth and nine persons were killed. The 
result of the raid was an immediate in- 
crease in voluntary recruiting. London 
was first bombed by Zeppelins on May 
31, 1915, and six people killed. From the 
date of the first raid to the middle of 
March, 191 7, about forty Zeppelin raids 
were made upon England. 



12 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Has America developed a 
standard motor? 

A. — Yes. It is known as the "Liberty 
Engine." The building of this engine was 
no inventing job. It was built to be 
standardized, and was a combination of 
all approved things. It was made so that 
it may be assembled anywhere and so 
that each part of one engine is inter- 
changeable with each similar part of any 
other engine. 

The ordinary automobile engine does 
not run wide open at full speed more than 
10 to 15 per cent of its. life. The Liberty 
engine must run at full speed, wide open, 
all the time. It was designed so that 
there shall be a minimum of waste and 
of supplies needed, with a maximum of 
efficiency. 

Q. — What is the horsepower of the 
Liberty motor? 

A. — The Liberty motor develops 400 
horsepower at 1,625 revolutions on a total 
weight of only 800 pounds, less than 2 
pounds for each produced horsepower. 
This is an exceedingly excellent showing 
as the celebrated British Rolls-Royce, 
which weighs 950 pounds, has never de- 
veloped more than 360 horsepower. 

Q. — What is the life of an aero- 
plane engine? 

A. — Experts say that it is rarely more 
than 100 hours. That is, it is necessary 
to substitute some new part after the 
engine has been running at full speed for 
100 hours. 

An idea of the complicated mechanism 
of the aeroplane may be gained by know- 
ing that there are 921 steel stampings, 79ft 
forgings cast, and 276 turn-buckles in 
a single machine. In a single battle- 
plane there are 23,000 screws. Seventy 
per cent of spare parts must be kept on 
hand for every battle-plane. 

Q. — Has the war evolved a distinct 
type of aeroplane? 

A. — The biplane has become almost 
supreme. The birdlike monoplane has 
practically disappeared. More general 
use of the triplane is a possible develop- 
ment of the near future. Improvements 
are constant, and new models soon be- 
come out of date. Aeroplanes are so fre- 
quently brought down within the oppos- 
ing lines that secrets in construction are 
few. Improvements are in the line of 
speed and responsiveness, rather than me- 
chanical safety, for the greatest danger is 
from enemy aviators. 



Q. — What are the principal aero- 
plane models in general use? 

A. — (1) The one-seated fighter, carry- 
ing a fixed machine gun in front of the 
aviator and a pivotal machine gun slightly 
above him. (2) The two-passenger re- 
connaissance or "general purpose" ma- 
chine, with pilot and gunner or observer. 
(3) .The large, twin-engine bombing ma- 
chine, carrying three or more men. 

Q. — How many types of aeroplanes 
are used in the American army? 

A. — Aeroplane needs for war purposes 
may be divided thus, as experience has 
shown : First, training machines ; sec- 
ond, advanced training machines ; third, 
battle-planes ; and fourth, heavy bombing 
planes. 

The training machines, for the purpose 
of aviators, are low-powered machines — 
that is, the engines are of from one hun- 
dred to one hundred and twenty-five 
horsepower ; the machines are slower than 
the battle-planes and very much easier 
and less tricky to handle. The men learn 
on these. These machines do not use 
Liberty engines. At present a four- and 
an eight-cylinder engine is being installed 
in them, which answers every require- 
ment. 

Q. — How can a photograph from 
an aeroplane make a picture 
that anybody can understand? 

A. — It doesn't. Very few persons can 
understand it. Aerial military photog- 
raphy has introduced a class of specialists 
in "reading" these photographs. To the 
ordinary human being they might be as 
meaningless as a picture puzzle. There 
are hundreds of tiny characters in a mili- 
tary aero-photograph that look utterly un- 
important to the ordinary person, but that 
indicate such vastly important things as 
bomb-proofs, guns, ammunition mounds, 
etc., to the expert. 

Q. — What type of camera is used 
for photographing from aero- 
planes? 

A. — The photographic aeroplane merely 
ascends to a given point, when, by press- 
ing a button or pulling a string, the cam- 
era is set in action automatically. Some 
photographic planes carry several cam- 
eras attached in such positions that sev- 
eral groups of pictures may be taken at 
once. The exhaust from the motor some- 
times is used to operate cameras that take 
rapid successive pictures. Photographs 



Man in the Air 



73 



that are perfectly clear have been taken 
from a height of three and a half miles. 
By means of color and light filtration, 
certain things, often invisible to the eye, 
are made to stand out sharply in photo- 
graphs of one especial kind. 

The aviator-observer may not be able 
to see such objects as men lying still upon 
the ground, wrapped in camouflage coats, 
but, by means of light filtration, the cam- 
era sharply reveals them. 

Q. — How are aeroplanes able to fly 
at night? 

A. — Navigation lights affixed to the 
edge of the lower plane and under con- 
trol of the pilot are used for flying at 
night. The lights are also invaluable in 
squadron formation as a guide to other 
machines in the group. German air raid- 
ers use variegated lights for signaling be- 
tween different units. 

Q. — How can an aeroplane effect a 
safe landing at night? 

A. — This is one of the greatest prob- 
lems an aviator has to solve, and in the 
early days of the war many disasters 
overtook the men who went up at night, 
owing to the bad landings. It is said 
that the Germans solved the problem in 
an ingenious manner. A pit was dug in 
the center of the aerodrome and covered 
over with a thick sheet of glass to with- 
stand the weight of an aeroplane, should 
its wheels pass over it. A powerful white 
light was placed in the pit. 

At a distance of about 250 feet from 
this light, and also sunk in the ground, 
were placed four red lights arranged in 
relation to the cardinal points of the 
compass. Each of these red lights was 
connected by underground wires to a 
wind-vane, mounted on a mast or tower at 
some convenient point. 

At night the central light glowed con- 
stantly, while the only red light that 
showed was the one in the direction of 
the wind that happened to be blowing, 
thus indicating to the pilot the wind con- 
ditions where the landing was to be 
made. 

Aviators landing in unlighted zones at 
night undertake excessive risks. Aero- 
plane pilots often drop flare-lights to il- 
luminate the ground on which they want 
to descend. Night flying is avoided as 
much as possible by all the belligerents. 

Q. — What are anti-aircraft guns? 

A. — They are guns so mounted that 
they may be pointed upward to deliver 



direct fire against objects in the sky. 
In the first stages of the great war they 
were very simple, often being merely im- 
provised. After a period of experience, 
they became more and more specialized, 
until they acquired a distinct status of 
their own, being fitted with unique ap- 
pliances and firing ammunition quite dif- 
ferent from that of other guns. 

Q. — What is the distinctive ammu- 
nition? 

A. — Shrapnel-shells that can ascend to 
great heights, with smoke-appliances so 
that the gunners could note exactly 
where the shells exploded, and thus cor- 
rect their aim continually. 

Q. — Were these guns successful? 

A. — They were extremely successful in 
forcing aircraft to fly high and avoid 
zones of aircraft fire. They did not de- 
stroy aircraft nearly so well. The best 
enemy of aircraft proved to be other air- 
craft. 

Q. — Did anti-aircraft guns not de- 
stroy many flying machines? 

A. — They certainly destroyed a num- 
ber. But it has been estimated by experts 
at the front that an average of 6,000 shots 
has to be expended for each aircraft 
brought down. 

Q. — How do gunners find the 
range of an aeroplane? 

A. — With an instrument called a tele- 
meter. It gives the exact altitude of 
the aircraft, and is as simple as it is in- 
genious. There are two apertures — one 
for each eye. In one the aircraft is seen 
right side up ; in the other it is inverted. 
By turning a thumbscrew the two images 
are brought together. When one is su- 
perimposed exactly over the other the al- 
titude is shown in meters, or feet, on a 
dial. 

Q. — Is the aviation service not the 
most dangerous of any in this 
war? 

A. — It was so considered when the war 
began. It seems likely, too, that in the 
first months the mortality among avia- 
tors was enormous. But after a few 
years, greatly to the surprise of military 
men, the aviators had developed such 
science and skill that instead of being 
the most dangerous, aviation actually had 
become the least dangerous service in the 
war. 



74 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Does this mean that few avi- 
ators are killed? 

A.— No. It means only that in pro- 
portion to the numbers engaged in the 
work, the losses are small. In percent- 
ages, infantry suffers the most casual- 
ties (just as it always has done in every 
war). Artillery comes next in percent- 
age of casualty; the medical corps comes 
third and aviation comes fourth. 

This fact has now been so well estab- 
lished that early in 1918 General Pershing, 
commander of the American expedition- 
ary force in France, recommended that 
the extra pay for aviators, based on the 
theory of extra-hazardous service, be dis- 
continued. 

Q. — Has anything new happened 
to make the aviator safe? 

A. — No, nothing new, unless we can 
call vastly increased skill and science new. 
The aviators have learned how to beat 
the anti-aircraft gun, for one thing. 
For purposes of destroying aeroplanes, all 
guns so far devised have been compara- 
tive failures. They are immensely use- 
ful for forcing aircraft to fly high and 
thus they hamper them in observation 
and bomb-dropping; but as instruments 
of damage they have not proved them- 
selves. 

Thus the only dangerous opponent that 
the aeroplane has to-day in war is another 
aeroplane. But, except for the extraor- 
dinary exploits of extraordinary individ- 
uals, and for the distinct fighting clan of 
the service, the average army aviator's 
chief business is not to fight but to scout. 
Therefore, though there^ are very many 
fierce combats in the air, almost daily, 
the regular daily work of aviation is not 
combative. 

Q. — Are there different branches 
of military aviation service? 

A. — There are four large general serv- 
ices nowadays in military aviation — ex- 
ploration, observation, bombardment and 
combat. There are aeroplanes whose sole 
duty is to observe, others who protect the 
observer from hostile attacks, others who 
are bombarders, etc. The Lafayette Esca- 
drille, for example, was mainly a bom- 
bardment fleet, dropping bombs upon the 
enemy's munition depots and railway 
lines before an attack. 

Q. — How fast does a fighting aero- 
plane fly? 
A. — The swift single-seat fighting ma- 
chines of the Allies at present are flying 
from 125 to 140 miles an hour. Each is 



armed with one or two machine guns, 
rigidly fastened to the aeroplane, and ca- 
pable of shooting only in the direction of 
the axis of the machine. 

Q. — How does a fighter attack? 

A. — One of the common maneuvers con- 
sists of diving from a sufficient distance 
to about 300 feet behind the adversary; 
dropping about 60 feet lower, and com- 
ing into position for firing by an upward 
dash. If the enemy has suspected nothing, 
it is sure death for him. 

Q. — What is a blimp? 

A. — "Blimp" is the nickname given by 
American air-pilots to a small American 
dirigible balloon used largely for coast 
scouting and for hunting submarines. 
The gas bag of the American blimp is 
about 150 feet long and 30 feet in diam- 
eter. The lower structure that contains 
the motors, crew, etc., is much like that 
of an airplane. The blimp is a hybrid of 
air-plane and balloon. It can make about 
40 miles an hour, carries 2 men usually 
and is armed with "depth bombs" — bombs 
which explode automatically at any de- 
sired depth under water. The advantage 
of a blimp is that it can be stopped so 
that it will remain motionless over any 
given spot. Thus it can hover over a sub- 
merged submarine and watch it till an 
opportunity comes for attack. 

Q. — What was our success in air- 
craft production? 

A. — The vast program had met many 
difficulties in the first year of war, but by 
autumn, 1918, they were being well met 
and in October of that year dispatches 
announced that American air fighters in 
France were being supplied rapidly with 
American machines. 

Q. — Are bombs aimed, or merely 
dropped, from aircraft? 

A. — Much progress has been made in 
bomb-sighting. The chief difficulty is 
to establish a true vertical direction. 
Modern bomb-dropping machines are 
equipped with instruments not only for 
sighting, but for determining allowances 
necessary for speed, height, wind, and so 
forth. 

Q. — How much bombing material 
can a Zeppelin carry? 
A.— The Zeppelin captured by the 
French had provision for eighteen 120- 



Man in the Air 



75 



lb. bombs — more than a ton. When a 
greater bomb-load is carried (often as 
much as four tons), fuel-load is sacrificed 
and safety impaired. 

Q. — How can aviators safely have 
glass windows and goggles? 

A. — In order to keep fragments of glass 
from injuring the pilot in case of acci- 
dent, triplex glass is used for windows 
and goggles. In a recent accident where 
an aeroplane, going ninety "miles an hour, 
struck a tree, the triplex glass window 
did not throw off a single fragment. 

Q. — What changes did 1917 bring 
in aeroplanes? 

A. — The most important change was 
the growth in size. Even the single-seater 
fast fighting machines are being built 
larger to accommodate a larger engine 
with water-cooling apparatus, which also 
necessitates a greater wing area in order 
that the machine may be slowed up 
enough for safe landing. The fighting 
aeroplanes were beginning to have two 
machine guns timed to fire between the 
propeller blades, and other guns to be 
fired at various angles. The slower recon- 
naissance type had also increased its en- 
gine power. The twin-engine machine 
was more and more used. Both the Ger- 
mans and the Allies had the pilot in the 
front cockpit handling one or two syn- 
chronized guns, with a gunner placed in 
the after-seat managing a gun on a turn- 
table. 

Q. — Do aeroplane guns really fire 
through the propeller? 

A. — Yes. The gun is regulated by a 
wonderfully ingenious yet simple appara- 
tus that times its shots so exactly that 
each bullet will surely pass between the 
blades of the propeller, though the latter 
is whirling as swiftly as it can go. 

Q. — What is the height record for 
aeroplanes? 

A. — The record to September, 1918, was 
held by Lieutenant Papa, of the Italian 
army, with 23,200 feet. On September 18, 
1918, Captain R. W. Schroeder, U. S. A., 
ascended to 28,900 feet over Dayton, Ohio, 
after a steady circular climb. He had to 
breathe oxygen from a tank which he 
carried with him, in order to survive 
through the rarefied air. 



Q. — When did the Wrights first 
fly? 

A. — In the summer of 1900 at Kitty 
Hawk, North Carolina, a tiny settlement 
on a strip of sandy land between the 
Atlantic Ocean and the big bay known 
as Albemarle Sound. Their machine was 
only 165 square feet in area. It was a 
bi-plane with a small plane at a short 
distance in front of the main surfaces. 
There was no motor. The idea was to 
launch it from a hill. The necessary ele- 
vation was found at Kill Devil Hill, about 
4 miles from their camp, with a height 
of about 100 feet. The experiments 
were so successful that in 1901 they took 
a much larger machine (308 square feet) 
to the same place. These glide experi- 
ments were followed on December 17, 
I9p3» by the first tests with a power ma- 
chine. 

Q. — What is a kite balloon and 
what is it used for? 

A. — Kite balloons are large balloons 
controlled from the ground by ropes. 
They are used for observation purposes 
on the fighting fronts and by the Allied 
navies in detecting U-boats. The balloon 
is attached to the deck of a trawler, and 
the observer, in his basket, can easily spot 
a submarine even when it is below the 
surface of the water. 

Q. — Have aeroplanes ever made use 
of smoke devices? 

A. — Yes. The big German Gotha aero- 
planes, which raided England from time 
to time, were equipped with apparatus 
for producing smoke clouds, which were 
emitted whenever the raiders were seri- 
ously threatened by anti-aircraft artillery. 
As the smoke was white and practically 
of the same formation as the clouds over- 
head, it was a hard matter for the gun- 
ners below to find the machines. 

Q. — Where did the aeroplane first 
prove its effectiveness? 

A. — First mention is made by Sir John 
French at the Aisne, in a report to the 
War Office in the first week of Septem- 
ber, 1914. He says, "Sir David Hender- 
son and the Royal Flying Corps have 
proved their incalculable value." 

Q. — What is the status of airmen 
caught while dropping printed 
propaganda? 

A. — There is no specific rule in inter- 
national law or the rules of war to govern 



76 



Questions and Answers 



the case exactly. The circulation of 
propaganda in enemy lines by air-route is 
entirely new. In previous wars there was 
the same effort to circulate propaganda 
among enemy soldiers and population, but 
it was attended with such difficulty that 
it did not reach great magnitude. 

Q. — What was done in previous 
wars to men caught circulat- 
ing such matter? 

A. — Usually the case was simple, be- 
cause the men who tried to spread it had 
to enter enemy lines in disguise, and thus 
were subject to execution as spies. If, 
however, a soldier should have stolen into 
enemy lines in his uniform with such 
propaganda, it might fairly be claimed 
that he should be treated like a soldier 
attacking an enemy line with weapons. 
But, presumably, his captors would not 
willingly take that view of it. 

Q. — Why is castor oil important 
to the success of aviation? 

A. — It has been found to be the only 
practical lubricant, and it was necessary 
for the United States to bring a cargo of 
castor beans all the way from Bombay, 
India, to speed up the industry of pro- 
ducing castor oil in sufficient quantities 
to carry out the big aviation program. 

Q. — Did the Kaiser have a narrow 
escape from a bomb from an 
aeroplane? 

A. — Yes. While the Kaiser was watch- 
ing the assault on Ypres from Thielt in 
Belgium, a British aeroplane dropped a 
bomb near his position, killing several 
members of his staff. There was no 
knowledge of his presence there on the 
part of the aviator. 

Q. — How does an aeroplane rise 
from a ship's deck? 

A. — Aeroplane-carrying warships are 
provided with a skid-way built as a super- 
structure over the decks and arranged in 
such a way that it does not interfere with 
the guns. Usually it is astern. The most 
modern type of air-ship-carrying vessel in 
our navy is thus designed. 

The aeroplane is lifted to the skidway, 
where it rests on a sliding platform or 
sledge. The naval aeroplane, being a 
hydro-aeroplane, is practically a flying 
boat, and, therefore, has no wheels with 
which it may start itself from the sur- 
face. Besides, the size of a ship is not 
sufficient to give a good start. There- 



fore, instead of projecting itself forward 
with its own engine power, as the land- 
plane does, the naval plane is shot from 
the ship by a catapult, which sends the 
sledge whizzing into the air with the 
plane on it. As the flying machine rises, 
the platform falls into the sea, to be 
picked up by the sailors. 



Q. — How does a naval plane return 
to the ship? Can it land on 
deck? 

A. — No. It returns as near to the ship 
as possible, and then glides to the water, 
where it floats on its pontoons or boats. 
Then it motors on the surface to the side 
of the ship. Tackles and purchases are 
lowered with sailors, who fasten the plane 
into a sling and the whole apparatus, 
aviators and all, is hoisted aboard and 
swung where it belongs. 



Q. — What is the reason for the 
shortage of spruce lumber? 

A. — Spruce has been found to be the 
only lumber with sufficient strength and 
lightness for aeroplanes. Uncle Sam has 
found it necessary to take over the entire 
spruce output and has been obliged to go 
into the forests himself with lumber 
squadrons of many thousand men to get 
out sufficient trees to build the thousands 
of aeroplanes now needed for the West- 
ern front. 

Q. — Is there no substitute for 
spruce? 

A. — Up to this time no satisfactory sub- 
stitute has been secured for spruce wood 
for the frames of the fuselage, the wings, 
the struts, and so on. It answers the pur- 
pose better than any other, resists shocks 
with greater strength, has a greater all- 
round capability than any other wood or 
metal that has as yet been tried. 

Q. — What is a penguin? 

A. — It is a machine for beginners, so 
called because it has only tiny wings, so 
that it cannot rise from the ground, but 
simply charges wildly along the earth 
on its wheels. The student-flyer learns 
steering and the use of controls in it, and 
as the machine really is very difficult to 
handle, he gets excellent training without 
danger. The penguin is propelled by the 
propeller like a regular aeroplane. 



Man in the Air 



77 



Q. — How many aviators has a mod- 
ern army? 

A. — For obvious reasons the numbers in 
the Allied armies and our own cannot be 
stated. The French say that during the 
fighting of July and August, 1915, the 
German air forces on the western front 
were 1,100 fighting machines, 1,100 scouts, 
200 bombarding machines, and 250 for 
maintaining communications with the 
infantry. Twenty-five hundred aviators 
would seem to be about what each of the 
big belligerents had in 1918. 

Q. — How heavy did airplane losses 
become during the big fighting 
in 1918? 

A. — While the statements made by both 
sides conflict very greatly as to relative 
losses, they agree in showing that the ag- 
gregate losses were enormous and contin- 
uous. An indication of the number that 
was destroyed and must be replaced day by 
day is given in the French statement that 
293 German airplanes were destroyed in 
July, 1918, on the French front alone out 
of a total of 338 acting there. It was 
stated that from January 1 to July 30, 
1918, the Germans had lost 1,504 airplanes 
as against 352 French machines brought 
down. The German claims of Allied 
machines destroyed were about equally 
great, so that it is easy to realize how 
great the destruction must be. On Sep- 
tember 2, 1918, a British dispatch said that 
in two days 19 German airplanes and 6 
hostile balloons had been destroyed. The 
6 balloons and 13 of the machines were 
destroyed in one day and the British lost 
9 machines. One estimate is that losses 
all around from all causes on all fronts 
aggregated more than one hundred ma- 
chines a day. 

Q. — How much bombing was done 
from the air? 

A. — This branch of fighting increased 
marvelously in a very few months. Spe- 



cial bombing planes were improved and 
enlarged continually. In the early part of 
1918 the British War Office reported that 
British aviators had, during January, 
dropped 7,653 bombs in enemy areas while 
the Germans had dropped 1,482 within the 
British areas. Of these the British 
dropped 5,900 in the daytime whereas the 
Germans bombed mostly at night, having 
been recorded as dropping only 221 in day- 
time. 

Q. — How much did bombing in- 
crease during 191 8? 

A. — In one day, according to a Paris 
dispatch of September 2, 1918, the French 
dropped 8 tons of bombs on enemy areas 
near Villers-Franquex and on stations at 
Maison Bleue and Guignecourt. At the 
latter place alone 4^2 tons were dropped. 
The British reported that in 2 days (up to 
Sept. 1, 1918) 12^4 tons .of bombs had been 
dropped. 

Q. — Could the Germans send aero- 
planes from submarines to 
bomb the United States? 

A. — They could, and in theory the prob- 
lem presents no difficulty at all. A hydro- 
aeroplane could be carried in the large 
very modern submarines in "knock-down" 
form, to be assembled on deck and 
launched to rise from the sea. In actual 
practice, however, very many and quite 
difficult problems interpose. Even a 
"knocked-down" aeroplane fit for fighting 
and bombing requires very considerable 
cargo-space. To assemble it on the deck 
of a submarine is possible but vastly dif- 
ficult. The machine could not be expected 
to make more than one flight. Even if it 
escaped being shot down, the chances are 
altogether against its pilots being able to 
find the submarine again. Without a base, 
the enemy pilots would have no choice 
except to come down in America as soon 
as their gasolene supply was gone, even 
though they might have evaded pursuers. 



OUR NAVY 



Q. — How many ships are in the 
American Navy? 

A. — We had more than one thousand 
within seven months after America de- 
clared war. This was an expansion from 
a navy of 300 vessels, which we had in 
1916. Of course we reckon in every type 
of ship in this aggregate, from the super- 
dreadnaught type to the submarine chas- 
ers and scouting craft. 

The vessels under construction at the 
end of 1917 were 800 in number, of which 
425 were large craft (ranging from all- 
big-gun ships to destroyers) and 350 were 
fast types of submarine chasers. 

Q. — What has been the increase in 
men? 

A. — On the day when war was declared 
the Navy had 64,680 enlisted men. _ On 
July 23, 1918, we had 209,831 men enlisted 
in the regular navy establishment, with 
9,327 officers, total 219,158. There were 
203,729 Naval Reserves, 15,846 officers, 
total 219,566. Coast guards were 6,377, 
officers 228, total 6,605, making a grand 
sum of 445,329. Adding the men of the 
U. S. Marine Corps and the National 
Naval Volunteers who had been combined 
with the Naval Reserves we had more 
than half a million men. 

Q. — What was our naval rank in 
1914? 

A. — Third among the great Powers in 
all-big-gun ships. The navies stood : 
Great Britain, Germany, United States, 
France, Japan, Russia, Italy, Austria, 
Spain, Brazil, Argentine, Chile. 

Q. — Did we compare at all in 1914 
with Germany in big ships? 

A. — Our Navy, on July 1, 1914, included 
these completed ships in service : Eight 
dreadnaught battleships, 22 predread- 
naughts, 25 cruisers, 51 torpedo-boat de- 
stroyers, 13 torpedo boats, and 30 sub- 
marines. We had at that date a naval 
strength of 66,273 officers and enlisted 
men. 

At the outbreak of war the German 
fleet had 28 dreadnaughts built and build- 
ing, 20 older battleships, 55 cruisers, 154 
torpedo craft, and 45 submarines. 



78 



Q. — Were we very inferior navally 
to England and Germany? 

A. — Decidedly so. In warship tonnage 
we stood as follows: 

Great Britain 2,158,256 

Germany 951,713 

United States 774.353 

France 665,748 

Japan . . L 519,640 

Italy 285,460 

Russia 270,861 

Austria-Hungary 221,526 

Q. — How many German dread- 
naughts were actually afloat in 
1914? 

A. — It is hard to say exactly, because 
there is always some uncertainty about 
ships actually afloat and ships nearing 
completion. Sometimes naval estimates 
carry all ships (completed, partly com- 
pleted and even contemplated) to show 
full strength. At other times, to conceal 
full strength, they show only the ships 
actually afloat and even of these they 
show only the undoubtedly first-class 
ones, relegating older ones to a second 
line. An apparently conservative list in- 
dicates that when war was declared Ger- 
many had at least 16 undoubtedly first- 
class dreadnaughts and battleships afloat 
and enough others building, or appropria- 
ated for, to make a total of 28, of which 
some very certainly were due soon to be 
launched. All these 28 were not, how- 
ever, "all-big-gun" ships. 

Q.. — How did the various Powers 
compare in big-gun ships in 
1914? 

A. — In big-gun ships Great Britain, ac- 
cording to the U. S. Navy Department, 
Office of Naval Intelligence, had in the 
end of the year 1913, 18 all-big-gun dread- 
naughts alone, with 14 building. Ger- 
many had 13 with 6 building. France had 
2 with 9 building. Japan had 2 with 4 
building. Italy had 2 with 7 building. 
Austria had 2 with 2 building. 

Q. — What are all-big-gun ships? 

A. — They are the very last thing in 
naval construction, being ships whose tur- 
rets are loaded to the limit of possibility 
with the largest rifled steel cannon ever 



Our ftlavy 



79 



made. The battleships of the past had 
various "batteries" of guns with many 
calibers. The "all-big-gun" ship is de- 
signed to do its smashing with a huge, 
swift discharge of projectiles of one_ size 
— the heaviest projectile ever used either 
on land or sea. 

Q. — How do the belligerents com- 
pare in battle-cruisers? 

A. — We know only how they did com- 
pare before the war. In the beginning of 
1914 they stood as follows : Great Britain 
9 and 1 building, Germany 4 and 3 build- 
ing, Russia none and 4 building, Japan 
1 and 3 building, and Italy and Austria 
none and none building. 

Q. — How many ships did Japan 
have when war began? 

A. — Our Office of Naval Intelligence 
stated, December, 1913, that Japan then 
had actually afloat 2 first-class all-big-gun 
dreadnaughts, 13 battleships of about 
10,000 tons each, 1 battle cruiser, 13 ar- 
mored cruisers, 14 other cruisers, 54 de- 
stroyers, 28 torpedo boats and 13 sub- 
marines. 

Q. — Has the American Navy any 
dreadnaughts? 

A. — We have many ships of the dread- 
naught and, indeed, super-dreadnaught 
class ; but the term is not used in our 
navy. These monster ships are called 
"battleships of the first line" by the Navy 
Department, and the favorite American 
naval name for them is All-Big-Gun 
Ships. 

Q. — What system is used in nam- 
ing American warships? 

A. — A very simple one, easy to remem- 
ber, and having the further virtue that 
whoever learns the principle can ever 
afterward identify the type (kind) of 
each American war-vessel as soon as the 
name is given. 

All armored ships (which means battle- 
ships and armored cruisers) are named 
after States. Cruisers are named after 
cities, with the general rule obtaining that 
a cruiser of the first class shall be named 
for a city of the first class, etc._ Gun- 
boats are named after smaller cities. 

Destroyers bear the names of naval 
officers who have won some historic dis- 
tinction. Submarines are known merely 
by a letter with a number after it de- 
noting their place in the class shown by 
the letter (as A-2). 



Fuel ships and colliers bear the names 
of Greek and Roman deities and heroes, 
such as Jupiter, Cyclops, Vulcan, etc. 
Supply ships bear such names as Supply, 
Glacier, etc. 

There are some exceptions in each type 
to the rule given here. Thus, one Ameri- 
can ship in the battleship line bears and 
probably always will bear the name Kear- 
sarge, to commemorate the famous steam 
frigate that sank the equally famous Con- 
federate Alabama, off Cherbourg, France, 
at the end of the Civil War. 

Q. — How many States are repre- 
sented by armored ships bear- 
ing their names? 

A. — Every State in the Union is repre- 
sented by a battleship of the first line, a 
battleship of the second line, or an ar- 
mored cruiser. That makes 49 capital 
ships named after States. But in 1916 
our line of armored big ships afloat, de- 
signed under construction, or ready to 
launch had grown so that we had 52 of 
them planned, 4 more than we had States. 
This overflow bears the names of four 
cities. 

Q. — What system does the British 
Navy use for naming ships ? 

A. — A leading principle in British 
naval nomenclature is to immortalize the 
names of famous British war-vessels. 
Thus there always is some capital ship 
in the British Navy bearing the name 
Revenge, after Sir Richard Grenville's 
famous ship that fought the Spanish fleet, 
as immortalized in Tennyson's poem. 
Such names as, Agamemnon, Vanguard, 
Warsprite, etc., are examples of this sys- 
tem. 

There also are names of enemy ships 
captured in illustrious actions. This ex- 
plains why some British vessels today 
bear French names. There is, however, 
no deliberate system that controls the 
naming of British ships throughout. 
Some bear the names of British Kings 
and Queens, others have merely charac- 
teristic names, such as Formidable, Ter- 
rible, Lion, etc. 

Q. — Do the Germans name ships 
for their naval men? 

A. — The Germans have had very little 
naval history. Therefore only a few of 
their warships bear names connected with 
sea-actions or sea-history. 

Their ships are named partly after Ger- 
man States or cities (Pommern, Liepsic, 
etc.) partly for sovereigns, and partly for 



8o 



Questions and Answers 



famous generals (Lutsow, Scharnhorst, 
Bluecher, etc.). Other ships are named 
for animals and sea-birds, like some Brit- 
ish ships. 

Q. — When was the first American 
gun fired in the war? 

A. — The first American gun of the war 
was fired April 19, 1917, from the steam- 
ship Mongolia at the periscope of a Ger- 
man submarine. The Mongolia was com- 
manded by Captain Rice, who thought at 
the time that the hostile craft had been 
sunk. It was later reported that the 
periscope had been smashed and the com- 
mander killed but that the submarine had 
not been sunk. 



Q. — What was the first American 
force in actual war service? 

A. — A flotilla of American U-boat de- 
stroyers under Admiral William S. Sims 
arrived at Queenstown May 4, 1917, and 
went into immediate service. 

Q. — Who is the ranking officer of 
the American Navy? 

A. — Admiral W. S. Benson, Chief of 
Naval Operations. Next in rank is Ad- 
miral Mayo, Commander-in-Chief of the 
United States Atlantic Fleet. 



Q. — What is the difference between 
dreadnaughts and old-time bat- 
tleships ? 

A. — The old-time battleship, which was 
considered the most tremendous thing 
afloat only ten years before _ the war, 
would hardly rank as a "cruiser" now 
against a modern American battleship of 
the first line (or dreadnaught). 

Where the old-time American battle- 
ship carried only four great guns, the 
modern dreadnaught type carries from 
eight to twelve. Where the old-time bat- 
tleship's great guns were twelve-inch di- 
ameter in the bore, the modern dread- 
naught carries guns that are 14 and 16 
inches. 

Dreadnaughts also are immensely su- 
perior in speed. The dreadnaught type 
has not less than 21 knots speed — that 
is, 24 land-miles an hour. The old-time 
battleship did not exceed 18 knots at its 
best. In addition, the armor of a dread- 
naught is thousands of tons heavier than 
that of the old battleship type. 



Q. — Do our dreadnaughts carry as 
big guns as British ships? 

A. — The very latest dreadnaught type 
of our ships — the all-big-gun ship, as 
American naval experts prefer to call it 
— will carry thelargesUnaval guns afloat, 
for they will have 16-inch guns mounted 
three in a turret. The navy is building 
a gun now of the same diameter but of 
still greater length and powder-chamber 
capacity. Armed with a main battery 
consisting entirely of these guns — from 
eight to twelve to a single ship — our 
American big-gun ships will actually be 
armed more tremendously than our big 
coast fortifications were ten years ago. 

Q. — Is the battle-cruiser a battle- 
ship or is it a new kind of ves- 
sel? 

A. — It is a very new type of vessel, 
produced by the efforts of naval con- 
structors to design a kind of ship that 
should be mighty enough to fight every 
vessel except a dreadnaught, and at the 
same time be so swift that it could escape 
from dreadnaughts. The result has been 
something that most naval constructors 
hardly expected — a ship that is a distinct 
hybrid type. It is neither dreadnaught 
nor cruiser, yet it has something of both. 

Q. — Is it heavily armed? 

A. — It carries guns so huge that a few 
years ago no constructor would have 
dared to suggest mounting them even on 
battleships. Its speed is so great that it 
actually is greater than that of the swift 
little torpedo destroyers of a few years 
ago, and yet, despite this speed, it is 
simply monstrous with armor-belting — so 
much so that it has turned out that a 
battle-cruiser, while inferior to a dread- 
naught, has some possible chance of fight- 
ing off a dreadnaught in any running 
fight that gives the battle-cruiser sea- 
room enough to choose and maintain its 
distance. 

This does not mean, however, that a 
battle-cruiser commander will deliberately 
undertake to fight a first-class dread- 
naught. The battle-cruiser's business is to 
avoid dreadnaughts and smash everything 
else. 

Q. — Are there any battle-cruisers 
in the American Navy? 

A. — Yes. During 1914 and 1915 Ameri- 
can naval experts were doubtful about the 
value of the type, and leaned to the belief 
that dreadnaughts probably would be the 



Our Navy 



81 



best part of a big navy. This belief in 
the superiority of dreadnaughts remains 
justified, but the naval operations in the 
North Sea have demonstrated the im- 
mense value of heavy ships with vast 
speeds in addition. 

We are now building battle-cruisers 
with speeds of 35 knots — 40.3 statute or 
land miles an hour ! These battle-cruis- 
ers are at least 14 knots (16 miles) faster 
than our best battleships — which means 
that if a battle-cruiser and a dreadnaught 
were to begin a fight at maximum gun- 
range apart, the battle-cruiser could run 
completely out of gun-range in less than 
two minutes. 

Q. — What were the expert criti- 
cisms of the battle-cruiser 
type? 

A. — The chief criticism was that they 
were heavier than was necessary against 
inferior ships (armored cruisers, etc.), 
and yet so inferior to dreadnaughts that 
they represented wasted power. Technic- 
ally, this criticism was sound, but it 
"stacked up" against the actual fact that 
the two big belligerents (Germany and 
Great Britain) did use battle-cruisers, and 
that, therefore, any navy that wanted to 
maintain its rank had also to produce 
battle-cruisers. Furthermore, the big fea- 
ture of the battle-cruiser — speed — has 
proved in fleet actions to be something of 
enormous importance, almost ranking 
with gun-fire itself as an actual part of 
combat. 



battle-cruisers 
the foreign 



Q. — How do our 
compare with 
ones? 

A. — The latest type of American battle- 
cruiser, on which construction is being 
hurried now, is a ship of 35,000 tons with 
35 knots speed. This type, of which six 
are to be set afloat, is 5,000 tons heavier 
and 13 knots faster than the Tiger type 
of Great Britain, which was recognized 
as the biggest battle-cruiser afloat in 1914 
and 1915. 

It is, also, larger and faster than the 
Queen Elisabeth type of super-dread- 
naught, and carries almost as heavy a 
turret-battery. 

Q. — Why do we never hear of tor- 
pedo boats? 

A. — The torpedo boat has vanished 
from modern navies. It was a terror to 
the imagination of naval commanders up 
to about the time of the Spanish-Ameri- 



can War, but it never proved itself. At 
the naval battle of Santiago de Cuba the 
last attempt in history by torpedo boats 
was made when the Spanish torpedo 
boats Pluton and Terror emerged from 
the harbor with the other Spanish ships 
and were sunk almost instantly by the 
United States ship Gloucester — a con- 
verted steam-yacht ! 

Q. — If the torpedo boat has van- 
ished, why have we so many 
torpedo-boat destroyers ? 

A.— They are torpedo-boat destroyers 
only in name, and hardly even in name. 
It is true that they were built originally 
to destroy torpedo boats ; but they have 
remained to fill a distinct naval place of 
their own. They are the "legs" of the 
fighting navy, and they form an inces- 
santly flying guard for its armored ship 
squadrons. 

Immensely fast, well armed with quick- 
fire rifled cannon as well as with many 
torpedo-tubes (both deck and under- 
water), they are formidable little war- 
vessels. Battles between destroyer flo- 
tillas have occurred many times in the 
great war, because these swift ships have 
practically taken over the monopoly of 
marine patrol, scouting and general sea- 
guard duty. They are known simply as 
"destroyers" now, and the original duty 
for which they were designed is prac- 
tically forgotten. 

Q. — Does "tonnage" in a naval 
vessel refer to internal capac- 
ity? 

A. — No. The word "tonnage" means 
two entirely different things in naval 
usage and in commercial usage. The ton- 
nage of a merchant ship really has noth- 
ing at all to do with weight. It is a 
measure of internal capacity pure and 
simple. 

The word "tonnage," describing the size 
of a warship, on the other hand, does 
actually and very specifically refer to 
weight. When we say, for example, that 
a dreadnaught is of 30,000 tons, we mean 
that the ship when afloat displaces that 
weight of water. 

Q. — Is any system used in naming 
the small ships added since the 
■war? 

A. — It has been impossible to do so. A 
number of the newly built motor-driven, 
scout vessels are named "Submarine 
Chaser No. So-and-so," but most of the 
vessels have had to be named hit or miss. 



82 



Questions and Answers 



The converted yachts largely retain their 
original names. The transports bear 
miscellaneous names, ranging from 
Prairie to Hancock (the latter being 
named for the noted General Hancock). 
The naval tugs mostly have Indian 
names, such as Choctazv, Iroquois, Nava- 
jo, etc., but there are many exceptions to 
this rule, since the war-expansion. 

Q. — What kind of warships have 
we the most of? 

A. — Destroyers form the biggest nu- 
merical part of the American Navy. In 
1917, when the, war began, we had on the 
list more than 60 destroyers of the type 
known as "sea-going" — that is, true war- 
ships which can cruise over seas like any 
other warship. Our newest and biggest 
ones approach the tonnage of the early 
American cruisers of the White Squad- 
ron, and in speed, rapidity of gun-fire and 
offensive power generally they would ac- 
tually outmatch any of those early cruis- 
ers in a ship-to-ship fight. 

In addition we have more than a score 
of secondary destroyers — vessels not suf- 
ficiently powerful or with a sufficient coal 
capacity to carry war over seas, but very 
good ships for coast work, for which rea- 
son they are known as "coast torpedo 
vessels." 

In the third line we have another score 
and more of torpedo boats. This is the 
old, original type of small craft, which 
was supplanted for battle purposes by 
the bigger destroyers. 

Adding the many big destroyers that 
have been launched since the war began 
(whose number it is not permissible to 
state) we thus have a really powerful 
fleet of this type alone. 

Q. — What is the size of our great- 
est all-big-gun ships? Are 
they bigger than the Ger- 
mans'? 

A. — They are positively bigger than 
any that the Germans had in the begin- 
ning of the war, and our experts believe 
that they are bigger than any in the Ger- 
man Navy to-day. We believe, with very 
fair foundation for the belief, that our 
all-big-gun ships average 25 per cent more 
in magnitude than the best German 
dreadnaughts. 

When war began, we had under con- 
struction five all-big-gun ships (what the 
British and German navies would call 
super-dreadnaughts) of 32,000 tons, with 
twelve 14-inch turret guns and armor 
belting 14 to 18 inches thick. 



Appropriations were granted after the 
war declaration for four ships of 32,500 
tons, carrying eight 16-inch turret guns ; 
and hardly had naval constructors 
achieved this daring conception, before 
naval science leaped forward and at one 
stroke made possible the design of four 
monsters of 40,000 tons, mounting twelve 
16-inch turret guns. 

These are the mightiest ships ever de- 
signed for any navy in the history of the 
world. 

Q. — Why do colliers accompany 
warships ? 

A. — Though modern warships can carry 
an enormous amount of fuel (coal or oil), 
they never can have too much, for mod- 
ern sea operations entail not only enor- 
mous cruising radius, but they demand 
such extreme speed that fuel is used up 
in incredible quantities. Each extra knot 
of speed demands an increased consump- 
tion of fuel, rising in extraordinary ratio. 
Therefore, every modern fleet is accom- 
panied by ships that are loaded to every 
inch of capacity with coal or oil. 

Q. — How do fuel ships load their 
fuel into warships at sea? 

A. — Fuel ships are genuine floating ma- 
chinery depots. The ocean, even on the 
calmest day that ever was, is in heavy 
motion. Even when there are no storm 
waves at all, there is a very big "heave" — 
mile-long undulations so great that the 
biggest warship rolls and pitches and 
.rises and falls. To attempt to lay two 
ships side by side would inevitably 
smash them both. Therefore, the only 
way to fuel a warship at sea is to main- 
tain a safe distance between the warship 
and the supply ship and send the fuel 
across the space of sea by machinery. 
The fuel ships have huge towers of inter- 
laced iron, and from these steel cables are 
sent across to the warship. Electrical 
machinery sends traveling coal-receptacles 
back and forth. 

Q. — Are our sailors really among 
the best gunners of the world? 

A. — Yes. This is due largely to the 
fact that we were ahead of other nations 
(even of Great Britain) in realizing that 
naval gunnery was not at all what it 
should be, or what it might be made. We 
learned a drastic lesson in the battle of 
Santiago de Cuba. Although our ships 
smashed the Spanish ships, an actual 
count and analysis of hits, as compared 
with the amount of gun-fire, showed that 



Our Navy 



83 



the percentage of hits was astonishingly 
meager. This was especially so in the 
case of the big-gun fire. Very few big- 
gun projectiles went home. The result 
was a great increase in American target 
practice at battle ranges. It was enor- 
mously expensive, but it paid. 

Q. — Can American naval gunners 
hit something with every shot 
of a big gun? 

A. — By no means. No navy has suc- 
ceeded in getting anywhere near such a 
record. In the winter practice in the 
Caribbean Sea, off the American naval 
base of Guantanamo, Cuba, our ships 
made records which are accepted as be- 
ing very remarkable. Firing at "battle 
ranges" — that is, at ranges not less than 
from 4,000 yards to 7,000 yards (2*4 to 4 
statute miles) the all-big-gun battleships 
averaged 21 per cent of hits at medium 
battle range and 7 per cent of hits at 
long battle range. The total average for 
all the types of ships at medium battle 
range was 11 per cent. 

Q. — Is that percentage really 
good? 

A. — It must be remembered that the 
ships were going at top speed when the 
firing was done. This means that the 
ranges were changing every second and 
the turret crews had to fire at the word 
of command. 

You must remember also that one single 
clean hit by a 14-inch or 16-inch shell at 
medium battle range is likely to wreck 
a dreadnaught, and, under any circum- 
stances, will be pretty sure to cripple it, 
either putting a turret out of commis- 
sion, dismantling its elaborate system of 
electric transmission or starting a fire. 



Q. — What do American warships 
cost? 

A. — The cost varies very widely with 
conditions of labor and prices of raw 
materials. The Pennsylvania, one of our 
very modern all-big-gun dreadnaught type 
battleships, cost almost $12,000,000, with- 
out its guns. The hull and machinery 
cost 7^/2 millions alone. The armor cost 
4 millions. 

A highly modern destroyer, such as the 
Ericsson, cost $874,000, without its guns 
or torpedoes, and a big fleet submarine of 
the L type cost a little more than 
$525,000. 



Q. — Are most of our ships coal- 
burners or oil-burners? 

A. — All our modern ships are oil-burn- 
ers. Indeed, if it were not for the fact 
that there still is some difficulty in sup- 
plying adequate amounts of oil, coal-burn- 
ing warships might be said to have gone 
wholly out of date. The Secretary of the 
Navy said in his report of December 1, 
1916, that "it may be stated tnat the 
scouts,_ destroyers and battle-cruisers 
authorized by the last naval appropria- 
tion act could not be built if coal were 
used for fuel." 

Q. — How much oil does a fighting 
navy consume? 

A— In active service (meaning active 
fighting, which kept the big ships well 
under motion for a good period) the oil- 
burning vessels of our navy at its present 
magnitude would require at least three 
million barrels in a year. This, probably, 
is a minimum estimate for such a theo- 
retical condition. 

Actually, even in a year of great activ- 
ity, the big ship fleets would lie at bases 
for a good part of the time or cruise at 
such slow speeds that consumption of oil 
would be kept down. 

However, even at best, the fuel de- 
mands are great. In 1915 the American 
Navy burned 521,000 barrels of oil, much 
more than a thousand barrels a day. In 
1916 it burned 842,000 barrels, or 2,300 
barrels a day. 

Q. — What are the tall tower-like 
skeleton things on our new 
warships? 

A. — They are the so-called "cage masts" 
which have replaced the old-fashioned 
"fighting top" mast. The latter was sim- 
ply a big hollow steel -mast with a cir- 
cular staircase inside leading to the fight- 
ing top — a lightly armored platform for 
observers and men handling light rapid- 
fire guns. 

The "cage mast" is a genuine tower, 
made of lattice steel, and it is a charac- 
teristic of our modern ships. 

The old-fashioned fighting top mast 
was liable to come down in ruin if one 
big shell struck it. The principle of the 
cage mast is that its web-like construction 
will enable it to stand even though a 
large number of shells plow holes through 
it. 

Q. — Is a knot the same as a mile? 

A. — No. A knot is a nautical mile, and 
is 6,080 feet. The mile, as known to 



8 4 



Questions and Answers 



landsmen, is the statute mile, 5^80 feet. 
A ship steaming 30 knots an hour would 
cover 34^ of our land-miles in that hour. 
For rough calculation it is customary to 
figure a knot as equalling 1 1-7 land-miles. 

Q. — What is meant by a "naval 
screen"? 

A. — It means the sending out of scout 
cruisers and other very fast vessels with 
enough cruising radius and power to 
sweep far ahead and abeam of the main 
fleet (sometimes half a thousand miles 
ahead) to prevent the scouts and cruisers 
of the enemy fleet from finding out any- 
thing. If the screening vessels are suf- 
ficiently powerful, they may sink or drive 
back the enemy scouts. If they_ are 
weaker than the enemy, they try either 
to draw them off on a wild-goose chase, 
or else they race back toward the protec- 
tion of their own fleet, sending wireless 
warnings as they go. 

Q. — What are territorial waters? 

A. — Territorial waters are the harbors 
and indentations of a nation's coasts, and, 
in addition, the open sea to a limit of 
three marine miles (6,000 yards) from 
the whole line of coast. This distance of 
three miles was fixed long ago, merely 
because at that time the utmost range of 
a coast cannon was about that distance. 
It has often been proposed to extend 
this territorial zone to ten or more miles, 
but the three-mile limit remains in force. 
Within that distance of a neutral coast, 
enemies may not fight or take prizes, etc. 

Q. — Why are the German naval 
guns not so big as those of the 
American and British navies? 

A. — The German naval principle was to 
depend on the very great power (ballistic 
property) which they deemed was assured 
by the Krupp method. They believed that 
this justified their reliance on 12-inch guns 
against the 14-inch guns which were be- 
ing mounted in increasing numbers in 
other navies. But after the arrival of 
15-inch guns in the British Queen Eliza- 
beth class, the Germans also began to de- 
sign 15-inch-gun ships. It appears rea- 
sonable to assume that our 16-inch turret 
batteries would heavily outclass the Ger- 
man ships of any date earlier than 1916. 

Q. — Does the term "all-big-gun 
ship" mean that these monsters 
carry no other guns? 

A. — No. They carry plenty of other 
guns — rapid-fire guns, machine guns, 



fighting-mast guns, anti-aircraft guns, 
automatics, and in addition a thousand 
or more rifles. Nor is that all. Peer- 
ing from armored ports on each side are 
the "little brothers" of the great turret 
guns — a row along each side of the ship, 
under deck, of 5- and 6-inch guns. There 
are as many as twenty and more of these 
guns in the "secondary battery" — a. bat- 
tery which would have been considered 
as being super-armament for a cruiser of 
President Cleveland's time when we be- 
gan our navy by building the famous 
"White Squadron." The heaviest ship of 
that squadron carried no guns bigger 
than 8-inch, and only a few as big as 
that. 

Q. — What is the battleship's most 
dangerous opponent? 

A. — Apart from its natural opponent, 
which is another battleship, the torpedo 
remains the one great menace to the bat- 
tleship. In every engagement during the 
great war, whenever battleships (dread- 
naughts) or battle-cruisers took part, 
they were harassed and endangered im- 
mensely by destroyer squadrons that ma- 
neuvered under thick smoke-clouds and 
launched torpedoes at long ranges. 

Several big armored ships that might 
have survived the gunfire of their equals 
were sunk by the little craft. But, on 
the other hand, it is undeniable that the 
torpedo has failed to prove itself such 
"sure death" as its enthusiastic support- 
ers had foretold. 

Q. — Are some American naval 
ships not named for flowers? 

A. — No. The ships you think of are 
Treasury Department vessels belonging to 
the lighthouse service. They are known 
as lighthouse tenders and are partly un- 
der naval rules — almost wholly so during 
war. These tenders bear such names as 
Myrtle, Golden Rod, Maple, etc. 

Q. — Did an American vessel fire on 
an Italian warship after the 
United States entered the war? 

A. — Late in the summer of 1917 the 
United States gunboat Nashville was in 
the Mediterranean on cruising duty when 
a submarine emerged suddenly. The 
Nashville broke out a signal which should 
have received an instant reply from a 
friendly vessel. No reply was made and 
the Nashville opened fire, killing one of 
the submarine's crew. Then there were 
signals which showed that the submarine 
was Italian. 



Our Navy 



85 



Q. — Just what kind of a warship is 
a cruiser? 

A. — In the old days of sail, and even in 
the early days of steam, almost any war- 
ship that was on active cruising duty was 
referred to as a cruiser. When steam 
and armor-plating came in, the term be- 
came strictly limited to certain types of 
ships, fairly large, swifter than other 
types, more or less protected, but not as 
heavy as the real armor-clads. 

Now, with the vast and phenomenally 
swift increase of our navy, the term has 
begun once more to be very wide. We 
have powerful ships known as armored 
cruisers, ships almost as big, but much 
less powerful, known as scout cruisers, 
and very light ships (scarcely protected at 
all except for a thin plating of extra 
steel around vital parts) known as light 
cruisers. In addition we have little mo- 
tor-driven patrol vessels that are called 
scout cruisers, though in former days 
they would have been known merely as 
patrol-boats. 

Then there is the new type of ship 
known as battle-cruiser, which, actually, 
is bigger than the battleships of a few 
years ago, mightily armor-belted and 
laden with turret-guns. 

Thus we may say that the term 
"cruiser," used by itself, has quite lost 
any specific meaning now. 



Q. — At what range can a gun fired 
from a battleship hit an object? 

A. — In the naval battle between von 
Spee and Craddock, off the coast of Chile, 
the two squadrons opened fire on each 
other with deadly effect at 12,000 yards. 
In the running fight off the Falkland 
Islands, most of the execution was done 
at a range of 15,000 yards (8J/2 statute 
miles). 



Q. — Does the armor protect mod- 
ern battleships absolutely? 

A. — No. It protects them only rela- 
tively. That is, at extreme fighting 
ranges these modern ships can receive the 
fire from the heaviest naval guns (12-, 
14- and 15-inch guns) and survive. But 
when the range falls to from 6.000 to 
4,000 yards the armor-piercing shell from 
big naval guns can perforate the armor 
on super-dreadnaughts. 

In warship construction, armor and gun 
have run a race for many years, with the 
gun always keeping a little ahead. 



Q. — How thick is armor on Amer- 
ican ships? 

A. — On the heaviest all-big-gun ships 
the armor belting is composed of steel 
plates 16 and 18 inches thick. A rough 
and ready naval saying is that armor must 
always be at least the same as the diam- 
eter of the gun that may attack it. Thus, 
14-inch armor for ships that may have to 
fight 14-inch guns, etc. 

Q. — What service is required of a 
naval hospital apprentice, first 
class? 

A. — The Hospital Apprentice First 
Class renders services required from a 
hospital orderly, with a training of six 
months in one of the four Hospital Corps 
Schools. He is enjoined to "study the 
methods of the Nurse Corps and learn all 
he can about the care of the sick." At 
sea during the past few months the hos- 
pital corpsmen have had very hard work. 

At shore stations beyond the seas the 
hospital corpsmen have been kept a little 
over the usual 18-month period. They 
may serve today on Asiatic stations, in 
Europe, and with marine forces on expe- 
ditionary duty. Physical and litter drill 
and first-aid instruction has been given to 
all hospital corpsmen. 

Q. — Have we established marine 
zones for coast defense? 

A. — Yes. An executive order of April 
13, 1917, established defensive areas at the 
entrance to chief harbors of the Atlantic 
and Pacific coasts, Gulf of Mexico and 
insular Colonies. No vessel may enter 
the limits of these areas except by per- 
mission of the harbor patrol and by fol- 
lowing certain definite routes. No ves- 
sels not belonging to the United States 
Navy may enter at night. Vessels dis- 
obeying are subject to detention for in- 
vestigation. 

Q. — Why does a sailor wear a 
black scarf? 

A. — This scarf is worn in memory of 
the sailors who have died in previous 
wars. There are four stripes woven in the 
edge of this scarf, representing the four 
great wars in which our Navy has par- 
ticipated. 

Q. — Why are a sailor's trousers 
made wide at the bottom? 

A. — There are two reasons. One is 
that in landing through surf from ships' 



86 



Questions and Answers 



boats, sailors must be ready instantly to 
leap into the sea when the boat gets into 
shoal water, to drag it up before the 
breakers swamp it. To do this, it is 
necessary that they shall be able to roll 
up their trousers above their knees with 
ease. 

The other reason is that one of the 
daily duties aboard ship is to "swab 
decks," and that is always done bare- 
foot and barelegged when the weather 
permits. The very wide, flaring trousers 
are, therefore, a matter of efficiency. 



different detachments of fleets. Impor- 
tant actions might take place, but it was 
often weeks before the admiralty knew 
anything about it. Now the govern- 
ments are in actual touch with every war- 
ship, no matter in what part of the world 
it may be. Every torpedo boat, even, has 
its wireless installation and can receive 
the admiral's orders direct. The subma- 
rines are similarly equipped. This makes 
it possible for the great battleships to lie 
far away from the coasts and yet be al- 
ways available when wanted. 



Q. — What is the significance of the 
thirteen buttons on a sailor's 
trousers? 

A. — These represent the thirteen orig- 
inal states. 

Q. — What is meant in the navy by 
the word "brig"? 

A. — It is ancient navy slang for the 
ship's prison. Every naval vessel has a 
group of cells for offenders. 

Q. — What other navy slang is 
there? 

A. — There is hardly anything in the 
Navy from the captain to the hold that is 
not known by a nickname. The captain is 
always called the "skipper" (exceptjpe- 
fore his face or before an officer)." A 
sailor is known as a "Gob." Hash is al- 
ways called "Ballast." A battleship is 
known as a "battle-wagon." The ham- 
mock is called a "dream-bag". Leaving 
the ship without leave is "jumping ship." 
An anchor is a "mud-hook." The elec- 
trician or wireless man is called "Sparks." 
The ship's carpenter is always called 
"Chips." 

Q. — How has the wireless changed 
war on the sea? 

A. — In the old days an admiral sailed 
away with his fleet, and was entirely 
responsible for its movements. Each in- 
dividual ship, in addition, sent on special 
service, had to rely entirely upon itself. 
One of the greatest difficulties was that 
of communication between the ships and 



Q. — Do aeroplanes have wireless? 

A. — The most up-to-date have, but the 
range is small ; ample, though, for scout 
ing work. Owing to the noise of the 
motors it is impossible to receive mes- 
sages on them, because aerial messages 
have to be read by sound. Therefore they 
can only send. Dirigibles, however, are 
fitted with wireless, which has a wide 
range, and can both send and receive. 

Q. — What is meant by "jamming" 
the wireless? 

A. — "Jamming" is generally resorted to 
by weaker ships trying to escape. They 
send a storm of electric waves through 
the air with such rapidity and strength 
that the pursuing ships cannot get mes- 
sages of warning through to other ves- 
sels of their fleet. 

The German cruisers Goeben and 
Breslau, which were apparently penned in 
the Adriatic by a big squadron of British 
ships, jammed the messages of the vessels 
that sighted them, and did it so success- 
fully that they succeeded in getting out 
of the straits of Otranto and running into 
the shelter of the Dardanelles. 

The Karlsruhe, when exchanging shots 
with the British cruiser Bristol, during a 
running fight in West Indian waters early 
in the war, also succeeded in jamming 
radiograms so that the British cruisers 
Lancaster, Essex, Berwick and Suffolk, 
which were all in those waters, did not 
succeed in getting the Karlsruhe's loca- 
tion in time to come up with her. The 
result was that she escaped into the 
South Atlantic and conducted disastrous 
raids on British commerce for many 
months. 



WEAPONS OF WAR 



Q. — What rifle are the Americans 
using? 

A. — The standard American military 
rifle is the Springfield army rifle, so 
named because made in the government 
armory, Springfield, Mass. Enough of 
these were on hand to arm fully the ex- 
peditionary forces that went to France in 
1917. When the first draft went into the 
home camps, the government had about 
600,000 Springfields. However, because 
several American munition works had 
plants adapted for making the British En- 
field, it was decided to adapt that model 
to our needs and the rifle thus produced 
for our army is known as Model 1917, 
Modified Enfields. 



Q. — What is our rifle production? 

A.— The U. S. Official bulletin of June 
12, 1918, said "the War Department au- 
thorizes the statement that rifle production 
has passed the 1J/2 million mark. Since 
the United States entered war with Ger- 
many the Ordnance Department has pro- 
duced 1,568,661 rifles. Of these 1.140,595 
were model 1917 (modified Enfields), 
176,796 were model 1903 Springfields (in 
addition to 600,000 in use), and 251,270 
were Russian models. At the end of Sep- 
tember, 2,437,297 rifles of all types had 
been produced. 

Q. — Is this enough for our big 
army? 

A. — Only about 50 per cent of the sol- 
diers in any army carry rifles. The War 
Department says that in August, 1918, we 
had enough for 2 million men with allow- 
ance for wastage. The daily average pro- 
duction in June, 1918, was 7,941. 



Q.— Was not the Enfield of a dif- 
ferent caliber? 

A. — Yes ; but the machinery was 
changed to make the Enfields take Spring- 
field ammunition. The British rifle was 
.303 caliber. The Springfield is .30 caliber. 
The magazine of both is loaded with a 
single motion by simply shoving in a 
"clip" with the requisite number of cart- 
ridges. The Springfield clip holds six. 



87 



Q. — Does the Springfield rifle 
shoot as fast as one can pull 
the trigger? 

A. — No. The Browning automatic ma- 
chine-gun rifle and some patterns of 
sporting rifles shoot that way, but no 
regulation army rifles are made on that 
principle. The army rifles are repeaters, 
but the soldier must throw each new cart- 
ridge into the breech by pulling down a 
little lever. It is an almost instantaneous 
operation. 



Q. — Why do armies not use auto- 
matic rifles? 

A. — Partly because the automatic rifle 
has a very much more complicated mech- 
anism than the army rifle. Partly because 
the army rifle gets very hard usage, mak- 
ing it essential that the parts be as few 
and simple as possible. Another impor- 
tant objection to the automatic principle 
is that soldiers waste cartridges blindly 
once they begin firing. 



Q. — How many machine guns have 
we? 

A. — Announcement authorized August 
17, 1918, by the War Department was that 
production of machine guns had passed 
the 100,000 mark, 108,973 machine guns of 
all types having been made, inspected and 
passed since the country entered war up 
to August 10. Of these 30,226 (nearly 
one-third) were Brownings (11,187 heavy 
and 19,039 light automatic). 



Q.— How did we produce heavy ar- 
tillery? 

A. — Sixteen enormous plants were 
either re-tooled or built "from the ground 
up" to manufacture mobile artillery can- 
non. Quantity production began in sum- 
mer, 1918. 



Q. — What weapons in this war are 
American inventions? 

A. — The submarine ("discovered by an 
American, Bushnell, in 1775), the torpedo, 



Questions and Answers 



the Gatling gun, the Maxim automatic 
machine gun, the Wright airplanes, and 
the Liberty motor are some of the im- 
portant contributions of American in- 
ventive genius to the armies of the Allies. 

Q. — Is there an explosive that turns 
men yellow? 

A. — Yes. It is an explosive with a 
name almost as weird as are its effects. 
It is made of a mixture of T. N. T. and 
a chemical compound called hexanitro- 
diphenylamine. It stains the skin a 
bright yellow color which cannot be 
washed off. It also causes highly irritant 
skin eruptions to workers, but they are 
not dangerous. 

Q. — What is meant by von Mack- 
ensen's "phalanx"? 

A. — A wedge-like tactic of General von 
Mackensen's army of attack around Cra- 
cow (Russian Poland) in the campaign 
of 1915. By the phalanx tactics, his army 
was fashioned into a mobile battering 
ram, battering its way by wide front 
breaches, opened by the heavy guns, 
through the Russian line. The Russian 
line, which was of long, thin formation, 
was pierced and crumbled under the 
wedge-like ram. The tactic was used 
largely on the Eastern front, where the 
opposing lines were of great length. 

Q. — Why is a big gun called "Big 
Bertha"? 

A. — It is a slang term invented by the 
German soldiers (and adopted by the op- 
posing armies) to characterize large 
Krupp cannon, because the present owner 
of the Krupp works is a woman, Bertha. 

Q. — What sort of weapons were 
utilized before cannon came 
into use? 

A. — There were many engines designed 
to fire arrows or hurl stones by mechan- 
ical means. The machines finally pro- 
duced were very powerful, and for a long 
time held their own easily against gun- 
powder. They worked on the catapult 
principle. One favorite weapon was a 
gigantic cross-bow, the predecessor of 
the cannon of today, and another was 
the ballista, which was the "howitzer" of 
the Romans. These weapons were used 
for siege warfare, and seldom appeared 
on the battlefield. Small catapults were 
occasionally used in the field, but the bal- 
lista was only used when attacking towns 
and fortresses. It was large and heavy. 



The largest threw a stone weighing 90 
pounds. The giant cross-bow weighed 
between 80 and 90 pounds, and would 
send a 26-inch arrow weighing half a 
pound close on 500 yards, but its man- 
killing capacity was limited to 400 yards. 
Other ancient weight-throwing weapons 
were modeled on the type of the catapult 
or the ballista. Then there were batter- 
ing rams and contrivances for protecting 
men attacking walls and the like. 

Q. — How were the catapults oper- 
ated? 

A. — The giant cross-bow was bent by 
drawing back the "bow-string" of rope 
or sinews with powerful levers. The bal- 
lista was a huge beam or plank set in a 
heavy platform, and it worked on the 
principle of a modern gun-trigger. To 
"set" it, it was hauled backward to firing 
position by men who operated stout haw- 
sers with levers or winches. When this 
tension was released, the plank was 
jerked forward with vast violence by a 
"spring" made of ropes or sinews that 
had been twisted to the utmost degree 
possible. 

Q. — What weapons did soldiers 
use during recent wars? 

A. — At Waterloo the British used the 
old Brown Bess flint firelock. In the 
Crimea they had the same gun, converted 
to use caps. Rifles based more or less 
on the Mauser mechanism are now most 
generally used. In fact, the French Army 
is the only one which has stuck to the far 
less convenient tube magazine. This 
French Lebel magazine rifle is an excel- 
lent weapon, but the mechanism is more 
liable to get out of order than that of 
the more simple Mauser. The Mannlicher 
rifle is used by the Austrians, the Italians, 
the Greeks, the Bulgarians and the Dutch. 
The Mauser is used by the Germans, the 
Belgians, the Spanish, the Portuguese and 
the Turks. The British use the Lee-En- 
field, the Russians the Nagant. Before we 
entered war, the American army rifle, 
was the Springfield. 

Q. — When was a breech-loading 
rifle used for the first time in 
war? 

A. — In the Austro-Prussian war, of 
1866, the Prussians used what was called 
a Zundnadel Gewehr (literally meaning 
"fire-pin gun"). They used the same gun 
in the Franco-German war of 1870-71, 
but the French had a better weapon, the 
chasse-pot. The German artillery was 



Weapons of War 



89 



better than the French, but the latter had 
the mitrailleuse, the forerunner of modern 
quick-firing guns. 

Q. — What is the meaning of the 
word "camouflage"? 

A. — The French word, freely trans- 
lated, means "to conceal." The term was 
taken over from the French slang word 
signifying the "make-up" of an actor. It 
was first adopted by the soldiers in the 
field, who have been wonderfully apt at 
devising phraseology to fit the novel as- 
pects of the great war. 

Q. — How is camouflage used by 
the navy ? 

A. — Strange designs resembling cubist 
pictures are painted on the hull and super- 
structure of merchantmen and troop- 
ships. The colors are gray, light blue 
and drab, often dotted with pink to blend 
with the atmosphere. Imitation billows 
are painted near the water line, which 
naturally make the vessel look much 
smaller than it really is. One large 
steamship recently came into an Atlantic 
port with a picture of a destroyer painted 
on its side, with all the rest of the boat 
painted in light gray. Since the destroyer 
is the great enemy of the submarine it 
is obvious why the merchantman wanted 
to be mistaken for a destroyer. 

Q. — How can such bright colors as 
pink conceal a ship? 

A. — There are two principles of camou- 
flage. One is the principle of conceal- 
ment, or "low visibility," as it is of- 
ficially termed. Under it, ships are 
painted in drab tints to make them blend 
against the more or less gray background 
of sea and sky. 

The other principle, known as that of 
the "dazzle," entirely abandons the the- 
ory of concealment and recognizes the 
fact that every ship, no matter how paint- 
ed, must inevitably stand out boldly and 
black when seen against the sun. There- 
fore, this second principle of camouflag- 
ing accepts visibility, and aims to paint 
ships in such broken designs and falsified 
prospective lines that a submarine ob- 
server cannot make any accurate estimate 
of the distance or direction of the vessel 
and shall thus be much hampered in lay- 
ing his course for it or firing at it. 

Q. — What are the methods of land 
"camouflage"? 

A. — It is done by painting, by screens, 
by boughs of trees, by wisps of raffia tied 
into nets — like backstop nets on a tennis 



court. Stacks of munitions, garages, bat- 
tery emplacements are covered by canvas, 
painted like the ground, so they cannot 
be discovered by spying aviators. Canals, 
Toadways, everything is camouflaged. 
Guns are hidden beneath a mattress of 
interwoven leaves supported by poles. 
Animated stacks of straw contain observ- 
ers who inch forward wherever possible, 
with telephone wires trailing behind them. 
Immense dummy cannon, mounted in con- 
spicuous places, with stuffed men, draw 
the fire and thus waste the ammunition 
of the_ enemy. Life-size scenery showing 
a straight railroad bed conceals an im- 
portant turn leading to a supply train. 
Whole trains, backed on sidings loaded 
with supplies, have been "painted out" of 
the landscape; buildings, bridges and all 
the necessary impedimenta, which go to 
supply the needs of vast armies, have 
been lost to the enemy airmen by the 
scientific use of broken color. 



Q. — How did 
nate? 



'camouflage" origi- 



A. — Because the aeroplane in war 
makes impossible the massing of men, 
guns or supplies behind the lines in the 
open, in scattered sectors along fighting 
lines the men who were in artillery or 
supply soon began attempts at conceal- 
ment of the great guns and supply wag- 
ons. This was done crudely at first, with 
tree branches, canvas screens, etc. So 
successful were these efforts that "camou- 
flage" quickly became a definite and im- 
portant principle of defense and artists of 
all sorts were withdrawn from the 
trenches and formed into a "Camouflage 
Corps." 

Q- — Does "camouflage" service re- 
quire special qualifications? 

A. — Yes. "Camoufleurs" are, almost 
without exception, artists, sign painters, 
scene painters, sculptors, mechanics or 
carpenters.^ The work demands a high 
degree of imagination, initiative and indi- 
vidual cleverness in planning. The 
"camoufleur" must learn to see with the 
"bird's eye," and, to obtain the right per- 
spective, must fly over the fighting lines 
with the aviator, taking note of the needs 
of the sector in which he is engaged, and 
his work is always on the firing line, so 
he needs resourcefulness and courage as 
well. 

Q. — Are there any American 
"camoufleurs"? 

A. — Yes. At General Leonard Wood's 
suggestion, American artists formed a 



90 



Questions and Answers 



corps, Of which H. Ledyard Towle is the 
head. General Wood is quoted as stating 
that each training camp must organize 
from its own members a "camouflage" 
corps. 

Q.— Whatistolite? 

A. — That is one of the many names 
for trinitrotoluol. T.N.T., Trotyl, Tri- 
tolo, Trilite and Tritol are some other 
names of the same substance. It is very 
safe, for it requires a heavy detonation 
to make it explode. It can be melted and 
poured into shells, without any danger. 
Water does not harm it at all. Yet when 
it does explode, its violence is terrific. 

Q. — Why could not gun-cotton be 
used in the shells? 

A. — It explodes far too easily. A shell 
charged with it would generally explode 
in the gun owing to the shock of the 
explosion of the propulsive ammunition. 
Picric acid and T.N.T. do not explode 
easily, hence they are suitable for shells, 
but they could not be used as propulsive 
ammunition. 

Q. — What is black powder made 
of? 

A. — Nitre, sulphur and charcoal. 

Q. — How is gun-cotton made? 

A. — Glycerine, nitric and sulphuric 
acids and cotton. 

Q. — To what extent is smokeless 
powder used in the war? 

A. — Only smokeless powder is used as 
a propulsive nowadays. Black powder not 
only dirties the gun's rifling, but it is less 
powerful. Above all, it immediately dis- 
closes the position of the gun, to hide 
which elaborate precautions are taken. 

Q. — What do we need to make our 
explosives? 

A. — Gun-cotton, nitroglycerine, trinitro- 
toluol (T.N.T.) , etc., all compounds, the 
manufacture of which in this country was 
in its infancy at the outbreak of the 
European war. One of the needed im- 
portant chemicals is sulphuric acid, which 
is obtained from sulphur and from py- 
rites, or "fool's gold." The principal 
source of the latter substance has hith- 
erto been the Spanish mines, but war 
has served to direct attention to Cuba, the 
New England States, Alabama, etc. 

Sulphur is obtained in considerable 
quantities from Louisiana. Scarcely sec- 



ondary in importance is nitric acid. It is 
obtained from Chile saltpeter. 

One of the results of the British em- 
bargo has been to cut off Germany's sup- 
plies of this substance, forcing her to ob- 
tain nitric acid wholly from the air by 
expensive processes. 

Toluol and ammonia, both ingredients 
of high explosives, are obtained from 
gas and coke, distillations of which also 
lie at the basis of the aniline dye industry. 

Q. — Are we making Toluol or 
T.N.T.? 

A. — Yes. By the beginning of 1918 
American by-product coke ovens were 
producing about 11,000,000 gallons _ of 
toluol, and the quantity was increasing. 
A difficulty is that the construction of 
enough by-product coke retorts requires a 
year. Gas companies can, however, equip 
their plants to remove the toluol from 
gas. 

Q. — Is the same powder used to 
propel shells as to explode 
them? 

A. — No. Propulsive and explosive 
powders are quite different. For pro- 
pulsive purposes black powder was at one 
time universally used, but has now been 
entirely discarded. Gelatinized mixtures 
of nitroglycerine and gun-cotton are now 
used exclusively. For filling the explosive 
shells picric acid and trinitrotoluol 
(T.N.T.) are used. For a detonator, ful- 
minate of mercury is practically the only 
compound employed. 

Q. — Why cannot one kind of pow- 
der be used for everything? 

A. — For a variety of highly technical 
reasons. Briefly and very generally, be- 
cause the "explosive" powder that bursts 
shells is so powerful that it would be 
liable to burst the guns if it were used 
as a propulsive powder. Furthermore, 
the high explosives generate gases of 
chemical composition that would "erode" 
gun chambers and gun bores — that is, eat 
them away. Again, the high explosives 
explode too quickly, whereas to get the 
utmost range, a shell must be hurled out 
of the gun by a "slow-burning" powder. 
Smokeless propulsive powder is slow- 
burning — as compared with the high ex- 
plosives. 

Q. — What materials are required 
for explosive powders? 

A. — Picric acid is made from a product 
of coal-tar called phenol and nitric and 



Weapons of War 



91 



sulphuric acids. T.N.T. is produced by 
similarly "nitrating" toluene, also a coal- 
tar product. The disadvantage of picric 
acid is that it attacks most metals, hence 
a shell filled with it has to be protected 
in its interior with some material on 
which picric acid will not act. Trinitro- 
toluol, on the other hand, suffers from 
no such disadvantage. Picric acid, how- 
ever, is mixed with nitrate of ammonium, 
charcoal, aluminium and trinitrotoluol. 
The resultant powder is called ammonal. 
It is largely used by the Austrians, and 
is very safe. It does not always explode, 
though, for it is apt to become moist. 

Q. — How much T.N.T. does a mod- 
ern army need? 

A. — It has been estimated that the 
American mobile artillery (heavy and 
light field artillery) might require as 
much as 2,000,000 gallons of toluol in a 
year. 

Q. — How much cotton does Ger- 
many need for explosives? 

A. — That is impossible to say, as we 
have no knowledge of the amount of ex- 
plosives being made in Germany. We 
must not forget, however, that cotton is 
used only for propulsive ammunition and 
not as explosive for filling shells. To 
make one ton of gun-cotton, half a ton 
of cotton fiber is needed, roughly speak- 
ing. A German Mauser cartridge con- 
tains 48.4 grains of gun-cotton, to pro- 
duce which would require something over 
25 grains of cotton. Assuming that there 
are 3,000,000 men in the field, and that 
they average 10 rounds daily for each 
man, we would have an expenditure of 
51 tons of cotton a day, or 18,600 tons a 
year, for rifles alone. If we assume that 
the expenditure on machine guns is about 
the same, we have a total of 36,000 tons 
a year. The average propulsive charge 
for field guns is, probably, 50 pounds. 
Assuming that the Germans are using 
5,000 guns, and that each fires ten shots a 
day, this would demand 1,000 tons of 
gun-cotton, for which about 550 tons of 
cotton would be required, or, say, 200,000 
tons a year. This, probably, is a large 
overestimate. These figures are purely 
speculative and have no value except as 
furnishing some basis for possible calcu- 
lation. 

Q. — Did Germany have cotton 
stored for war? 

A. — It is assumed that Germany used 
some 100,000 tons of cotton annually for 



making 180,000 tons of gun-cotton. If she 
had stored this for the last five years 
before the war, she could have had at 
least 900,000 tons of gun-cotton available 
when the war started. During 1913 Ger- 
many and Austria imported in the ordi- 
nary way 560,000 tons of cotton. Un- 
doubtedly a good deal of this could not 
have been transformed into manufactured 
articles, and thus would be available. 
During 1914 it is assumed that some 12,- 
000 tons reached Germany via Sweden, 
and that she also got supplies via Hol- 
land and Italy, especially the latter. It 
was calculated at the time that Germany 
would have sufficient cotton to carry her 
through two years' war at any rate, and 
she may have been able to get hold of 
enough to last for three years. It would 
seem inevitable, however, that the time 
came in 1917, when lack of this impor- 
tant ingredient in the making of ammuni- 
tion became a critical problem to Ger- 
many. A certain amount of cotton is pro- 
duced in Turkey, but even if the cotton 
fields there were greatly developed since 
the war began, nothing like enough could 
be obtained from that source. In 1912 
the total cotton output of Turkey was 
about 200,000 bales. As there are 400 
pounds in a bale this means that the total 
production of Turkey was only 40,000 
tons. 

Q. — Is there no substitute for cot- 
ton? 

A. — Cotton consists of cellulose, the 
chief constituent of wood, but cotton fiber 
appears to be the only form of cellulose 
adapted for making gun-cotton. There is 
always the possibility that under the 
stress of urgent need the German chem- 
ists have discovered a substitute for cot- 
ton, as they have for so many other 
things, but it is unlikely. 

Q. — What is the biggest cannon 
used in war? 

A. — Cannon calibers have increased pro- 
gressively during the war. The gun of 
greatest length and power made its ap- 
pearance in March, 1918, when the great 
German offensive broke through the Brit- 
ish St. Quentin front and began the vast 
Battle of Picardy. 

On March 24, projectiles began to fall 
into Paris, which was 64 miles from the 
very nearest German line on that date. 
The greatest range ever achieved by a 
gun before was 20 miles. 

The largest American gun in 1918 was 
the 16-inch coast-defense rifle. It has a 
range of somewhat less than 20 miles. 



9 2 



Questions and Answers 



The big gun with which the Germans 
so swiftly destroyed the fortifications of 
Liege and Namur was a 42-centimeter 
gun, meaning in inches that its caliber 
(the diameter of its muzzle) was 16*/* 
inches. For a long time army officers 
could not credit that a mobile gun of 
such power could really exist. 

This famous 42-centimeter weapon was 
on the howitzer order — that is, it did not 
fire its projectile with a fairly flat trajec- 
tory as the rifled cannon do, but dis- 
charged it by so-called high-angled fire : 
it was pointed toward the sky and thus 
sent its shell flying in a great arc. 



Q. — Have the Allies a bigger gun 
than the German "Big Ber- 
tha"? 

A. — The French recently built a mortar 
of 52 centimeters caliber as against the 
Germans' 42-centimeter gun. One of 
these guns was used by the French in the 
Verdun surprise attack of August, 1917- 
Two shells fired from this gun were suf- 
ficient to wreck Fort Malmaison. 

This French 52-centimeter gun is, in 
our figures, a trifle under 20^2-inch diam- 
eter. 



Q. — Are solid cannon-balls used 
any more? 

A. — Practically every projectile from 
every kind of cannon nowadays is an ex- 
plosive shell — that is, a conical steel shell 
that has in its pointed head a large hollow 
chamber filled with high explosive. Some 
of these explosive shells have a contact 
primer in their points — a primer that ex- 
plodes the charge when the projectile 
strikes. Most shells, however, are fitted 
with a time-fuse so set that the shell 
explodes in a certain number of seconds 
after it leaves the muzzle of the gun. 



Q. — Is it possible to set a time- 
fuse accurately? 

A. — Yes. A modern artillerist knows 
to the fraction of a second how long it 
requires for his projectile to go a certain 
distance. Range-finders and aeroplane 
observation (spotting) enable him to fig- 
ure to the foot just how far away the 
target is. The time-fuse is set in the 
pointed snout of the shell, and adjusted 
just right with a key the moment before 
it is shoved into the gun. 



Q. — Are the great twelve and 
fourteen-inch shells exploded 
by time-fuses? 

A. — No. These huge shells are used 
chiefly against ships or against fortifica- 
tions. They are made to explode on im- 
pact — by "percussion," as artillerists call 
it. There is a firing pin in the sharp 
point of the shell, and when the projec- 
tile strikes this pin is driven home and 
explodes fulminate of mercury, which, in 
turn, explodes (detonates) the big burst- 
ing charge. 

In most cases these firing mechanisms 
in the big shells are so set that the pro- 
jectile has time first to smash through 
the ship's armor, so that it shall explode 
inside. 

Q. — What are time-fuses like? 

A. — They are of a vast variety of de- 
signs. For many years there have been 
specialists in every army in the world 
who studied and designed little else but 
fuses. Some time-fuses are simply little 
contrivances that contain a powder-fuse 
of a determined length. This is lit by the 
discharge of the gun, and, at about the 
time that the projectile reaches its goal, 
the flame reaches the explosive charge. 
Other fuses are operated by little vanes 
that revolve as the projectile speeds 
through the air. Still others operate by 
clockwork mechanism. 

Q. — What is the artillery equip- 
ment of the American Army? 

A. — The War Department decided in 
1917 on the practical adoption of the 
French 75-millimeter (2.955-inch) field 
gun ; a continuance of 3-inch field guns 
(American pattern) for use in camps at 
home ; Colts, Browning, Vickers-Maxim 
and Chauchat automatic machine guns ; 
4.7-inch field guns, 6.10-inch, 8-inch, 9.2- 
Inch and 10.5-inch howitzers ; Lewis ma- 
chine guns for aeroplane work. 

Q. — What is a howitzer? 

A. — Its prototype is the ancient ballista 
of the Romans, a machine which hurled 
great stones in a mighty arc through the 
air, so that, vaulting the defending walls, 
they fell on the soldiers behind. That is 
to say, the attack came from above, whilst 
that of the catapult, the forerunner of the 
modern gun, came from the side. The 
howitzer of today is really a development 
of the mortar. It is a short piece of ord- 
nance, designed, like the old ballista, 
to throw a heavy projectile so high into 



Weapons of War 



93 



the air that it can fall from above on 
objects behind cover, which would be 
quite safe from the ordinary high-velocity 
gun. 

Q. — Does it require a heavy- 
charge? 

A. — A comparatively small charge is 
needed, just enough to propel a huge 
shell through the air. It is not the speed 
of the shell which does the damage, but 
the bursting of the large amount of high 
explosive in the shell itself. As all a 
howitzer need to do is to give a great 
shell a toss into the air, so to speak, it 
does not need to be a long or very power- 
ful weapon, compared to a field or naval 
gun, which latter weapon must actually 
drive its projectile almost straight to its 
target. 

Q. — How big is a howitzer? 

A. — The latest German ones are no less 
than 16.5 inches, inside diameter. These 
guns are, of course, rifled, and load at the 
breech. We get some idea of the differ- 
ence between howitzers and guns by com- 
paring the two British six-inch weapons. 
The six-inch howitzer fires a steel shell 
weighing 122 lbs., including a lyddite 
bursting charge of 19 lbs., while the six- 
inch gun has a 100-lb. shell, and a 10-lb. 
lyddite bursting charge. The howitzer 
weighs 30 cwts., the gun 7 tons ; the for- 
mer is 7 feet 10 inches long, the latter 
23 feet 3 inches. 

Q. — What does the 16.5-inch how- 
itzer weigh? 

A. — They weigh about 14 tons and are 
about 18 feet long. The British 11-inch 
howitzer weighs 6 tons, and is 14 feet 
long. 

Q. — Does the weight include the 
carriage ? 

A. — No ; the gun only. The equipment 
of a 12-inch howitzer weighs about 27 
tons ; that of a 16.5-inch gun would prob- 
ably be not far short of 50 tons. The 
carriage can, of course, be taken to pieces 
for transport purposes. 

Q. — To transport a howitzer of this 
size must be a great task? 

A. — So difficult is it that these weapons 
are used for siege purposes only. It is 
said they require specially prepared ce- 
ment bases, and cannot be used accu- 
rately without them. The Germans have 



smaller howitzers, which they use in the 
field. A 12-inch howitzer weighs about 
7 tons. 

Q. — How are the great howitzers 
transported? 

A. — The great howitzers are pulled by 
heavy motors called "caterpillars," a mod- 
ified form of engine with its wheels en- 
circled by an endless steel band, and 
driven by a petrol motor. 

On the outbreak of the war, they were 
pulled by horses, but later mechanical 
transport was provided for them. First, 
"Foden steam wagons," a kind of auto- 
mobile, were employed, but proved im- 
practical. 

Q. — How heavy a projectile would 
it throw? 

A. — This also is not known. Its ter- 
rible effects have been seen, for these 
guns reduced the forts at Liege by smash- 
ing the steel cupolas of the defending 
cannon as if they had been egg shells. 
Four shots sufficed to put one of the 
Namur forts entirely out of action. As 
a six-inch naval gun fires a 100-lb. pro- 
jectile, and a six-inch howitzer one of 
120 lbs., we may assume that a 16.5-inch 
howitzer has a shell weighing at least a 
ton. ' (The 16.5 naval guns fire a pro- 
jectile of 2,200 lbs.) A special explosive 
is said to be used, which has a terrible 
effect. In fact, all those wounded found 
in the forts after the shells had fallen 
there were deaf. 

Q. — What is the range of a how- 
itzer? 

A. — The n-inch howitzer has an effec- 
tive range of five miles. The 16.5-inch 
will naturally have more than that. A 
shell from one of these guns might kill 
an entire company. 

Q. — Is it true that these immense 
howitzers can only fire twenty 
times before wearing out? 

A. — That is probably incorrect. We 
know that the great naval 12-inch guns 
can fire at least ninety rounds before 
wearing out. This comparatively short 
life is due to the tremendous heat and 
the gases generated by the explosion, 
which, in time, crack and corrode the 
rifling. As already mentioned, the func- 
tion of a howitzer is to toss a huge shell 
into the air; a huge charge is not re- 
quired, hence the life of a howitzer should 
be far longer than that of a naval gun. 






94 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Is a big cannon useless after it 
fires that limited number of 
shots ? 

A. — No. But it becomes inaccurate and 
no longer has full range. The trouble, 
however, is only with the inside of the 
bore, and this can be replaced in the ord- 
nance works. It is known as putting in 
a new core. It is, of course, an opera- 
tion requiring some time. 

Q. — Does it take long to make a 
howitzer? 

A. — Nothing like as long as to make a 
naval gun. The latter takes about 
eighteen months, working during the day 
only; it must be wire wound, a process 
which requires much time. Howitzers 
only take weeks, where the guns require 
months. It is the mounting which takes 
so long to make. 

Q. — Could howitzers be used in 
naval warfare? 

A. — No. It would be impossible to hit 
rapidly moving ships with them. The 
only vessels armed with _ such weapons 
are monitors, which are intended to at- 
tack land forces and fortifications. 

Q. — Is the machine gun a cannon? 

A. — No. Its barrel is practically a rifle 
barrel, except that it is heavier in weight. 
Its caliber is no larger than that of the 
infantry rifle. Every army tries to have 
its machine guns and its infantry rifles 
exactly alike in caliber, so that the same 
ammunition can be used for both. 

Q. — How does a machine gun fire? 

A. — It fires semi-automatically, or 
sometimes automatically. In some pat- 
terns the cartridges are fed into the 
breech from a revolving belt. In others, 
they are fed in a revolving disk. 

Q. — How fast does a machine gun 
fire? 

A. — So fast that the human senses of 
sight and hearing cannot perceive the 
separate shots. A modern machine gun 
fires about ten shots a second, or from 
500 to 700 shots a minute. 

Q. — What is machine-gun range? 

A. — Its range is about a mile, but in 
action it usually is used at much shorter 
ranges than that. Fired at a target a 



mile away, most of its ammunition would 
be wasted. 

Q. — Exactly what purpose does the 
machine gun serve? 

A. — The same as that of the infantry 
rifle — that of killing men. These two 
are the firearms used by armies for that 
purpose, whereas cannon are used more 
largely for making positions untenable 
and thus routing large bodies of men. 

Q. — Who invented the machine 
gun? 

A. — The modern machine gun was in- 
vented by Richard Jordan Gatling. It 
was first used in the Civil War, and con- 
sisted of ten revolving barrels. The 
French in the Franco-Prussian War, also 
used a machine gun, the mitrailleuse, 
which was worked with a crank. The 
modern single-barrel machine guns are 
Vickers-Maxim, Benet-Mercier, Hotch- 
kiss, Colt, Chauchat, Lewis and Brown- 
ing. 

Q. — What machine guns are used 
most? 

A. — The British army uses Vickers- 
Maxim and Lewis largely. The French 
use Chauchat automatics. The American 
army has both Vickers-Maxim and Colt. 
The army adopted a new gun, the Brown- 
ing. For aeroplane work and sea service, 
the Lewis gun has been adopted. The 
camps in the United States were supplied 
with some specimens of the French Chau- 
chat, as well as with Lewis, Vickers- 
Maxim and Colt. 

Q. — What is the Browning gun? 

A. — The Browning type is the very 
newest type of machine gun. Early in 
1918 it was announced that its manufac- 
ture was being pushed forcefully, and 
that General Pershing had asked for this 
type in preference to others. It is to be 
a wholly automatic gun — that is, its oper- 
ator need merely pull the trigger and 
hold it so. So long as the trigger is held 
in that firing position, the gun will shoot 
as fast as the cartridges can pour into it. 
After the first shot, the recoil does it all 
— ejects the fired cartridge, throws a new 
one into the firing chamber, and dis- 
charges it, repeating the process so long 
as the cartridge supply holds out. 

Q. — Do the guns not get hot from 
such tremendous firing? 

A. — They get almost red-hot. For this 
reason they all have water-cooling de- 



Weapons of War 



95 



vices, which generally consist of an outer 
case around the barrel filled with water. 
One objection to the guns has been that 
the steam thus generated often betrays 
the gun-position. The Browning ma- 
chine rifle has a device to counteract this, 
and is so constructed that 350 shots can 
be fired before the gun needs cooling off. 
The Browning machine gun (a heavier 
type than the rifle) has a water-jacket 
like other machine guns. 

Q. — Can the Browning machine 
gun be used like a rifle? 

A. — Yes. One pattern, known as the 
Browning machine rifle, can be fired from 
the shoulder or the hip. It weighs only 
15 pounds. This new American machine 
rifle takes 20 cartridges for one load. All 
that the soldier needs to do is to cock the 
hammer and pull the trigger. After that 
he needs merely keep his finger pressing 
the trigger and the gun will shoot until 
its ammunition is gone. That is not a 
long time, however — for the Browning 
machine rifle will shoot its 20 shots in 
from 2y 2 to 3 seconds. 

Q. — How is the Browning machine 
gun fired? 

A. — It is on a tripod and the gunner 
kneels or sits behind it. An endless cot- 
ton belt feeds the cartridges into the 
gun. The belt holds 250 cartridges, and 
the gun fires them as fast as they can be 
thrown in by the automatic feed. A 
Browning machine gun, in an endurance 
test, fired 20,000 shots in 2,896 seconds, 
or almost 10 shots a second. 

Q. — Have the Germans many ma- 
chine guns? 

A. — It is now known that the Germans 
had about 50,000 of these guns in the be- 
ginning, and, despite losses due to wear- 
ing out, scrapping, or capture, it is said 
that the enemy has now no less than 
75,000. The Germans appear to supply 
one machine gun to twenty men on the 
front line. 

Q. — What is the difference be- 
tween a rapid-fire gun and a 
machine gun ? 

A. — The machine gun is of small cali- 
ber and fires cartridges of the caliber of 
army rifle cartridges, which are fed into 
it automatically as quickly as the weapon 
can shoot. 

Rapid-fire or quick-fire guns are actual 
cannon of calibers up to 6 inches, loaded 



by hand at the breech with large, fixed 
ammunition ; that is, ammunition which 
is like a cartridge, containing both the 
propulsive powder and the projectile in 
one. These guns can be fired as fast as 
the gunners can snap open the breech, 
eject a fired shell-casing, and ram in an- 
other one. _ Rigid practice and team-work 
make possible an astounding number of 
discharges in a minute. 

Q. — What is the difference be- 
tween these quick-firing guns 
and the larger guns ? 

A. — The difference between these quick- 
fire cannon and the still larger sizes is 
that the larger ones are loaded with a 
projectile first, then with powder. This 
separate loading (due to the impractica- 
bility of making the big projectiles in 
cartridge form) naturally makes their 
fire slower. Remarkable speed, however, 
is attained by good gun crews even with 
the biggest calibers. Naval gun crews 
can fire a number of shots a minute with 
the huge twelve- and fourteen-inch tur- 
ret guns, though each discharge entails 
the handling of several tons of powder 
and steel. 

Q. — Has American shell-making 
capacity increased? 

A. — The shell-making capacity for 75- 
millimeter (2.955-inch) and 3-inch shells 
was reported officially in January, 1918, 
as increased 50 per cent, and the increase 
for sizes above that was 25 per cent. At 
that time the Ordnance Department stated 
that it had under order 59,803,910 shells 
to be delivered in 1918. 

Q. — What was our status of can- 
non production after we de- 
clared war? 

A. — In his speech before the Senate 
Committee on Military Affairs, January 
28, 1918, the Secretary of War said that 
Lewis machine guns for aerial use were 
then being manufactured "in large num- 
bers" ; that the distribution of machine 
guns to national draft camps was 30 Colt, 
45 Chauchat, 65 Lewis ; National Army 
cantonments, 50 Colt, 45 Chauchat, 65 
Lewis. He said that during January 620 
75-millimeter field-pieces (2.955-inch) had 
to be supplied by France, while Ameri- 
can works could turn out only 84, but 
that by April the ratio would be : French, 
73 ; American, 231 ; and by December, 
1918, the American output would be 433 
a month. Against one 155-millimeter 
(6.10-inch) howitzer in January, iqi8. 



96 



Questions and Answers 



American output would be 300 a month 
by the end of the year. 

Q. — Has Germany everything 
needed for explosives? 

A. — She does not produce all the raw 
materials, but her chemists have been able 
to get what is needed from other sub- 
stances. Sulphur, for instance, is hardly 
found in Germany, but in the Hartz and 
Silesia there are deposits of ores contain- 
ing sulphur, such as galena (sulphide of 
lead), blende (sulphide of zinc), and 
some others. She has no nitre (salt- 
petre), which comes from India, Peru 
and Chili. When distilled with sulphuric 
acid, it yields nitric acid, which is used 
in "nitrating" glycerine, cotton, phenol 
and toluene. For fifteen years, however, 
nitric acid has been won by obtaining the 
nitrogen from the air, in Sweden, and it 
is known that the Germans have extensive 
plants for the same purpose. Glycerine 
is a product of the soap works. There is, 
of course, plenty of coal tar, from which 
phenol and toluene are won. Not only 
have the Germans their own coal mines, 
they have the Belgian and French ones 
also. The one important thing they ap- 
pear to lack is cotton. 

Q. — Can the copper in fired cart- 
ridges be used again? 

A. — Of course it can. The belligerents 
are all saving the shells of the cartridges 
used when at all possible. In trench war- 
fare probably none are lost, either from 
machine guns or rifles. This fact is 
usually overlooked by those who make 
careful calculations as to the amount of 
copper Germany must import, or mine to 
keep her armies supplied. They gathered 
all used material on the battlefields from 
the very beginning. 

Q. — Has Germany enough iron? 

A. — Plenty. » In 191 1 the United States 
mined 443,000,000 tons. The United 
Kingdom, 271,900,000; Germany, 158,000,- 
000; and France, 38,000,000 (the latter 
from mines now almost all in German 
possession). In the same year the United 
States produced 41,000,000 tons of iron 
ore, Germany 29,500,000, and the United 
Kingdom 15,500,000. Germany has made 
great strides in the manufacture of steel 
and iron. She produced 14,800,000 tons 
of steel to England's 6,500,000 tons in 
191 1, and 15,300,000 tons of pig iron to 
England's 9,720,000 tons. The United 
States easily leads the world, producing 



nearly 24,000,000 of steel and almost the 
same quantity of pig iron. Since the war 
the production of iron and steel has, no 
doubt, immensely increased in Germany; 
for she is momentarily in possession of 
all the coal and iron in Belgium and some 
two-thirds of the total production of 
France. 

Q. — What is supposed to be the life 
of a rifle? 

A. — It is calculated that a rifle will last 
about a month in active hard service. 
This means that 80,000 men would get 
through 1,000,000 rifles in a year. But 
please note' that this is in "active hard 
service." That is a theoretical condi- 
tion for which the army command must 
be prepared, because it may become a 
fact at any moment. But in actuality it 
will happen very rarely that any one body 
of troops actually will fight hard and con- 
tinually for a whole month. 

Q. — What size shell does an eigh- 
teen-pounder gun fire? 

A. — It fires a shell 3.3 inches in diam- 
eter, and sends it 2>Yz miles. The thirteen- 
pounder used by British horse artillery 
fires a 3-inch shell. Its range is a little 
greater than that of the eighteen-pounder. 
The famous French 75-mm. gun fires a 
shell just a shade less in diameter (2.955 
inches). 

Q. — What does enfilade mean? 

A. — Enfilading fire is the military term 
for a raking fire. A gun enfilades a 
trench when it is placed in such a posi- 
tion that it can fire straight along it, and 
enfilades troops when its fire takes them 
on the flank. 

Q. — When did the Germans first 
use poisonous gas? 

A. — In May, 1915, at Hill 60 on the 
Ypres line, against the British. It was the 
kind that became known as chlorine gas, 
because that chemical was its chief con- 
stituent and gave it its chief deadliness. 
It was produced by volatilizing liquid sul- 
phurous acid and liquefied chlorine, a 
process that liberates enormous bulks of 
vapor. Its principal action was on the 
bronchial tubes and the lungs, which it 
injured seriously, leaving pitiable after- 
effects. It caused intense suffering, and 
the men caught in the first gas-attack 
were, of course, quite helpless, being un- 
provided with any defense. As one sol- 
dier said : "The ghastliest wounds were 
sweet compared to it." 



Weapons of War 



97 



Q. — Was this gas sent from guns? 

A. — No. It was liberated from cylin- 
ders and it could be used only when the 
wind blew toward the opposing lines. 
Even then there always remained the 
chance that a shift of wind might blow it 
back. Therefore, terrible as the new 
weapon was, gas-warfare did not assume 
dominant importance until, realizing its 
possibilities, the armies began to project 
it inside of explosive shells. By the mid- 
dle of 1918 it had become "the deadliest 
instrument of the war." 

Q. — Did chlorine gas remain the 
worst? 

A. — No. Gas inventions accumulated 
with gruesome rapidity. Gases appeared 
that strangled, suffocated, blinded and 
paralyzed. Some of the gases were com- 
paratively harmless, causing only tem- 
porary disability or simply forcing aban- 
donment of gased areas. Others were 
frightful. 

Q. — How can gas overcome men in 
the open air? 

A. — The gases used are heavier than 
the air. The gas, therefore, flows into 
trenches and underground shelters like 
water, and thus strangles men who hap- 
pen to be anywhere where air-currents 
may drive the poisonous fumes. The lat- 
est gases make even open areas unin- 
habitable. 

Q. — Can men tell in time when gas 
is coming? 

A. — Most gas shells explode with much 
less noise than is made by any other 
explosive shell. The odor also warns of 
the arrival of most gases. There is a 
regular signal now to warn of gas. A 
rocket is sent up or automobile horns and 
other signals are sounded, and every man 
knows that he must put on his gas mask 
at once. 

Q. — What is phosgene gas? 

A. — It is a perfectly odorless gas. _ If 
the soldiers are not warned by identifying 
the peculiar exploding sound which the 
phosgene shell makes, there is no other 
way to discover it. It cannot be detected, 
indeed, until the heart stops beating and 
the victim falls dead. 

For defense against this, men were spe- 
cially trained to distinguish the slight 
difference in tone between the detona- 



tion of a gas shell and other shells, and 
it became their business to watch for the 
deadly arrivals. 

Then the Germans met this with an- 
other move which for a time seemed to 
baffle all efforts to counteract it. They 
mixed gas and explosives in the same 
shell. This is the form of attack they 
tried on the Americans in February and 
March, 1918. 

As an emergency measure the Allies 
then ordered gas masks to be worn con- 
tinuously, but the Germans invented 
sneeze bombs and tear bombs to force 
the men to take their masks off. 

Q. — Is there a defense against gas? 

A. — Yes — one, and one only. It is the 
gas mask. The United States is spending 
millions now on gas masks, and they are 
as indispensable a part of a soldier's out- 
fit as cartridges. It is estimated that 20 
per cent, at least, of the shells that are 
fired are gas shells. So vast a part of 
war has gas become that the United 
States has a Gas Defense Service in its 
Medical Department. 

Q. — Were gas masks invented in 
this war? 

A. — Soon after the first German gas 
attack English and French women sent 
to the front hundreds of thousands of 
home-made gas masks. For the most 
part, they were merely bandages impreg- 
nated with chemicals to wrap around the 
mouth and nose. 

The next thing in gas masks was a 
cloth helmet or hood dipped in neutral- 
izing solution, the bottom of which was 
tucked in the collar. This hood had two 
eye goggles. Air was breathed in through 
the cloth. The chemicals in the cloth fil- 
tered the incoming air, but there was no 
provision for exhalation, and within a 
short time the man was unable to get a 
proper amount of good air. 

The next improvement was to put in an 
exhaust or outlet for the exhaled air. 
This type of mask has been used exten- 
sively. Its disadvantages are that a man 
cannot hear well, the chemicals in the 
cloth cause him trouble, and the mask 
cannot long remain impermeable to gases. 

Q. — What is the most terrible gas? 

A. — Mustard gas — so-called because it 
causes burns in addition to its other ter- 
rible effects. The name is a misnomer, 
however, for there is no mustard in it 
and when it is loaded into the shells it 



9 8 



Questions and Answers 



is not a gas, but an amber fluid which 
emits gas after it is discharged from the 
exploding shell. Both the liquid and its 
gas are deadly. The gas kills by inhala- 
tion and the liquid burns the skin sav- 
agely and destroys eyesight. It does not 
evaporate after a few hours like other 
gases; the gas stays in a drenched area 
2 to 4 days according to conditions, and 
all objects, even the soil drenched by the 
liquid remain dangerous to the touch for 
days. 

Q. — How is it used? 

A. — It is projected from regular artil- 
lery in shells that have _ thinner casing 
than the common explosive shell. The 
effective principle in its use is to send 
enormous quantities of shells into a given 
area to deluge it with the liquid, which is 
sent far and wide in a fine mist. In one 
attack in early 1918 the Germans sent 
7,000 tons over. In April, 1918, they so 
drenched Armentieres that neither side 
could dare enter it. The streets and gut- 
ters ran with the reddish-brown liquid. 

Q. — Is there any warning against 
it? 

A. — Practically none, except the sound 
of the bursting shell. It has only a faint, 
sweetish, not disagreeable odor and the 
vapor can be inhaled without immediate 
discomfort. The liquid looks harmless, 
and a drop on a soldier's coat looks only 
like a drop of oil and does not hurt the 
cloth. 

Q. — What does mustard gas do? 

A. — Inhalation of the vapor causes 
"chemical pneumonia" — high fever, ago- 
nized breathing and sometimes stupor. 
Autopsies have disclosed that it breaks 
the lung tissues down "like wet paper," 
according to Dr. Benjamin T. Brooks, one 
of the American experts who is aiding 
our gas-mask service. The oil itself pene- 
trates through cloth. At first it causes 
only a slight smarting, but some hours 
later the flesh puffs and reddens, the tis- 
sues swell enormously, and a deep burn 
appears and widens over the area. It 
blinds not only by immediate contact but 
by. communication through bodily tissues. 

Q. — Have the American troops a 
defense against mustard gas? 

A. — The government has announced 
that the Chemical Warfare Service of 
the U. S. Army has met all the condi- 
tions caused by mustard gas. The Ameri- 
can mask is full protection against 
inhalation, and an ointment has been de- 



veloped as protection for the skin. The 
first month's shipment to France was 
800,000 tubes of this new defense-mate- 
rial. Men who are sent into trenches to 
clear them of gas are dressed in special 
underwear chemically treated. 

Q. — Have we found out how to 
make mustard gas? 

A. — Our chemists succeeded some time 
ago. Mustard gas first appeared late in 
1917 and was not used formidably till 
March, 1918. However, in January, 1918, 
chemists reported to the War Depart- 
ment that 75 tons a day should be pro- 
duced and before August quantity produc- 
tion was undertaken. 

Q. — What gas mask are the Amer- 
icans using? 

A. — A very scientific respirator mask 
with a face piece of absolutely impervious 
material, with glass or celluloid eye 
pieces, held in place by rubber bands 
around the head. A canister is carried 
in a small knapsack and a flexible tube 
connects with the face piece. 

Inside the face piece is a small wire 
clamp with rubber pads, which fits on 
the nose and forces the wearer to breathe 
through his mouth. The end of a flexible 
tube has a rubber mouthpiece, through 
which the man breathes. The incoming 
breath comes through the canister, which 
is filled with several layers of special 
chemicals of an absorbent nature, that 
neutralize or render harmless the gas- 
laden air. The outgoing breath passes 
outside the face piece through a small 
rubber valve. 

Q. — Is the American gas mask like 
the German? 

A. — No. In the German mask the con- 
tainer for the neutralizing chemicals was 
screwed into a ring in the bottom of the 
mask. There was no outlet valve for the 
exhaled air, both incoming and outgoing 
air passing through the container. 

Q. — How are the gas masks used? 

A. — The mask is carried in a knapsack 
at the left hip, supported by a shoulder 
band. When troops approach a danger 
zone, the straps are shortened and the 
knapsack is shifted to rest high on the 
chest, ready for instant use. This is 
known as the "alert position." The sol- 
dier has merely to open the knapsack, 
pull out the flexible hose with the face 
piece attached, put the rubber mouth- 
piece in his mouth and adjust the bands 



Weapons of War 



99 



over his head. The nose clip can easily 
be adjusted from the outside after the 
face piece is on. This nose clip insures 
that even if the fabric of the face piece 
should be pierced, the soldier would still 
be breathing entirely through his mouth. 

Q. — Do the American gas masks 
furnish absolute protection? 

A. — The present American mask affords 
more protection than any other device in 
existence. The chemicals in the canister 
will neutralize the heaviest concentra- 
tions of gases for a period at least ten 
times longer than the possible duration 
of any gas attack. 

For every mask there is at least one 
extra canister. These canisters are de- 
tachable from the tube. When a canis- 
ter has lost its efficiency, it can be de- 
tached, and a new canister put on. 

A Gas Defense School has been estab- 
lished in each cantonment, and a gas 
mask factory, with 4,000 workers, was 
organized early in the war. 

Q. — What is liquid fire? 

A. — The basis of modern liquid fire as 
used in this war is petroleum, serving 
both to make the flaming stream and to 
project it. It is a successor to the fam- 
ous "Greek fire" of ancient time, which 
was invented by Callinicus, an architect. 
This was made, it is thought, of sulphur 
and naphtha, with quicklime to start the 
ignition when wetted. It was especially 
efficacious against ships. 

Q. — How is liquid fire used? 

A. — It is sprayed from portable con- 
tainers, known as projectors. The pro- 
jectors are brought as close as possible, 
under concealment, to the point of attack, 
arranged in groups of from 50 to 200 and 
more, and discharged at the desired mo- 
ment. They squirt the blazing material 
into the enemy lines, as a fire-engine 
would squirt water. 

Q. — What is a lachrymal shell? 

A.— A _ shell filled with a gas that 
causes _ violent flow of tears with sharp 
eye-irritation. Many such tear-irritants 
are familiar to chemists. One is acrolein, 
obtained by burning fats of glycerine, but 
the Germans lack such fats. Another 
source is formaldehyde. A tear-excitant 
can be extracted by applying heat to com- 
mon pepper, and red pepper (paprika) is 
one of the big Hungarian products. Pro- 
tective measures are comparatively simple. 

Q. — Was gas ever used before? 

A. — The Chinese used the famous 
"stink-pot" ages ago. Devices that made 



strangling smoke were used extensively 
in the sieges of Troy and Carthage, and 
remained a fairly formidable war-weapon 
through the Middle Ages. In modern 
times such instruments had been consid- 
ered as prohibited to civilized nations 
under Article XXIII of the Hague Regu- 
lations : "It is forbidden ... to employ 
arms, projectiles or material calculated 
to cause unnecessary suffering." 

Q. — What is a glacis? 

A. — The name given to the ground in 
front of a fortification. It is sloped so 
that it can be covered thoroughly by the 
fire from the guns of the fort. 

Q. — Are the tanks merely armored 
cars? 

A. — They are much more. Armored 
cars were well understood when the great 
war began, though they were, of course, 
not nearly so highly developed as they 
became by 1918. They are, however, in 
principle merely automobile gun carriages, 
armored to protect gun crews and guns. 
The tank, to the contrary, is a genuine 
moving fortification. Its crew is con- 
cealed entirely within it, and its power 
is so vast that the enormous bulk and 
weight moves irresistibly forward. Won- 
derfully devised traction, based on the 
caterpillar principle devised by American 
makers of agricultural tractors, impels it. 
This traction is a pair of huge, endless 
steel chain-belts, and the tank truly crawls 
forward instead of depending on wheels. 
The strength of the apparatus is so great 
that tanks can actually crawl into and out 
of trenches,^ shell-holes and other places 
that would defy wheeled vehicles^. 

Q. — How are the British tanks 
armed? 
A. — There are two types of British 
tanks. One carries two six-pounder, 
rapid-fire Hotchkiss guns and four Lewis 
machine guns. The other is armed with 
six Lewis guns. Each type weighs about 
thirty tons, and is manned by an officer 
and seven men. The armor plate fs of 
^4-inch steel of a special composition, and 
has great powers of resistance against 
rifle, machine gun and shrapnel fire. 

Q. — What is the best weapon used 
against the tanks? 

A. — The most efficacious weapon against 
the tanks is the armor-piercing bullet. It 
is feared by the crews of the tanks, be- 
cause it pierces the armor and frequently 
sets fire to the fuel reservoir. 

Hand grenades, employed one at a time, 
are useless. It is necessary to employ a 



IOO 



Questions and Answers 



concentrated charge (several cylinders 
grouped around a central grenade), and 
throw it under the tank; but this is a 
difficult task. 

Machine guns are useless against them. 
But the tanks, in turn, are vulnerable to 
heavy steel shells from any of the field 
artillery guns used today. 

Q. — Have tanks become very for- 
midable weapons? 

A.— In August and September, 1918, 
when the British, French and American 
armies began their enormous advance, the 
tanks played a very important part indeed. 
The Germans ascribed at least some of 
their disaster to huge "fleets" of tanks. 

Q. — Is the tank not a brand new 
war invention? 

A. — They were used exactly 2,157 years 
before they made their appearance on the 
British-German lines. In the tremendous 
siege of the "Queen of Africa" Cartnage, 
the Romans attacked the walls with "tor- 
toises" — immense tortoise-shaped tanks 
on wheels, whose backs, covered with 
timber, iron scales, hides and straw pad- 
ding protected the soldiers underneath 
against the liquid fire, projectiles and 
boiling water that rained down on them 
from above. They also attacked with a 
huge armored tower on wheels, the fam- 
ous "Hellepolis." The attacks failed. 
The Carthaginians devised a defense 
against each new apparatus in turn. 

Q. — What does the word "abatis" 
mean? 

A. — It is a military term to describe 
one of the obstacles which, when the war 
began, were used in defense of field 
works. Such defense is probably obso- 
lete now. It was formed of the limbs of 
trees, twelve or fifteen feet long, _ laid 
close together, the larger branches pointed 
towards the enemy and the stems secured 
to the ground. The object of an abatis 
is, of course, to break up the enemy's 
advance. Nowadays heavy explosive 
shells sweep such obstacles out ofthe way 
with ease. Barbed wire takes its place 



Q. — Who used barbed wire first in 
modern warfare? 

A. — The Boers in South Africa, and 
then the Russians and Japanese in Man- 
churia. It is now one of the most im- 
portant of defensive appliances. 



Q. — How is barbed wire cut by the 
soldiers? 

A. — Hand wire-cutters are used at 
times, but the main dependence is on spe- 
cial shells. These are not made with thick 
walls, as it is not the flying fragments 
which do the damage when the shell ex- 
plodes, but actually the wind of the ex- 
plosion. A Dumezil shell will clean up 
a network of wire over an area of about 
100 square feet. These special shells are 
thrown a distance of about 1,200 feet by 
small trench howitzers. 

Q. — Can the most complicated wire 
entanglements be swept aside 
in this way? 

A. — The ordinary entanglements can- 
not stand against these shells, but there 
are methods of arranging the wire in 
spirals, which effectively defy the shells. 
In fact, the more the spirals are bom- 
barded the more the different coils be- 
come entangled, forming an inextricable 
jungle, on which hostile attacks are vain. 
The French have greatly developed this 
method of wiring, which they call Brun 
networks. 

Q. — Who invented barbed wire? 

A. — An American, Colonel Elbridge 
who, it is said, used his wife's hairpins 
for barbs in his early experimental work. 

Q. — Is gasolene vital to modern 
war? 

A. — It has made a probably vital dif- 
ference. Owing to its use transport has 
been greatly accelerated, and guns espec- 
ially have been moved with wonderful 
speed. Besides the tanks, there are steel- 
clad motor-cars with turrets, from which 
heavy, rapid-fire guns pour streams of 
lead. Anti-aircraft guns are moved on 
gasolene carriages to points where they 
are needed. Even the mighty howitzers 
and siege guns are dragged by gasolene 
or oil-driven engines, and it is used for 
the ambulance cars, and all manner of 
transport. 

Q. — Does anybody know the 
amount of British orders for 
munitions placed here? 

A. — From August, 1914, to the middle 
of July, 1917 (about 3 years), the British 
Government placed orders for ordnance 
of all kinds and all kinds of ammunition, 
totaling $1,308,000,000. An illustration 



Weapons of War 



101 



of the scale of American preparation is 
the fact that in the seven months follow- 
ing the entrance of the United States into 
the war (from the middle of May to the 
middle of December, 1917), the Ordnance 
Department of the United States Army 
placed orders for $1,500,000,000. 

Q. — What is a duck walk? 

A. — A term first applied in humor and 
since then in regular military use, for the 
slatted wooden walks that are laid in the 
muddy trenches. 

Q.— What is a Firing Step? 

A. — It is a narrow ledge running along 
a parapet. The soldiers stand on it if 
they want to look over the top or fire. 

Q. — How are star-lights fired? 

A. — They are fired from a specially 
made pistol and they are used to illumi- 
nate the surroundings. 

Q. — Why are some shells called 
Whiz-bangs? 

A. — There is one kind of German shell 
which makes that kind of a noise on ar- 
rival and on explosion. The soldiers in- 
vented the name for it early in the war. 

Q. — Where does the word 
"Blighty" come from? 

A. — It was slang used to denote "home" 
by the British troops that had seen In- 
dian service, and was simply the East 
Indian word for it. The soldiers from 
England promptly applied it to their home 
across the Channel, and thus "Old 
Blighty" came practically to mean Eng- 
land. 

Q. — Was Germany short of shells 
after the battle of the Marne? 

A. — It was said that she was, although 
in those early stages of the war, before 
the trench dead-lock was established, 
nothing like the number of shells and 
guns was needed as is required today. 

Q. — What is meant by bridgehead? 

A. — A bridgehead is a position which 
commands the crossing of a river. It is 
not necessarily at an actual bridge to span 
the stream. Owing to the long range 
of modern guns a bridgehead may ac- 
tually have to be a long way away from 
the river itself, as its function is to pre- 



vent the enemy artillery from interfering 
with the crossing army, and to hold a 
position that shall enable the big body 
of the army behind to form in security. 

Q. — Is the French 75 the greatest 
artillery weapon? 

A. — Among quick-firing guns it still was 
said in late 1918 to be pre-eminent. It' 
had this immense advantage that it did 
not require to be re-aimed after each dis- 
charge. The recoil is entirely taken up 
by the shock-absorbers and the gun points 
at exactly the same mark all the time. 
The following comparison between the 
75 and its German rival is interesting : 

French 75. German 77. 

Length 8 feet 734 feet 

Maximum range 334 miles 3 miles 

Shots per minute 25 9 

Weight of shrapnel 15 lbs. 14 lbs. 

W'ght explosive shell 11 lbs. 11 lbs. 

Initial velocity sec. 1720 feet 1510 feet 

Bullets in shrapnel 300 300 

Weight of cannon 2250 lbs. 1950 lbs. 

Gunners with each piece 7 8 

Guns in battery 4 6 

Batteries per army corps 30 24 
Total number of cannon 



(1914) 



2520 



3600 



Q.— Has the shell of the French 75 
been altered since the war? 

A. — The main alteration has been the 
increased number of fragments into which 
the projectile breaks. One of these 
shells now bursts into more than 2,000 
pieces, some of them so small as to 
wound fatally without making a conspic- 
uous abrasion on the skin. The tiniest 
of particles possesses so great a velocity 
as to inflict grave injuries at 30 or 40 
yards from the spot where the shell 
bursts. 

Q. — Why have the Germans not 
mastered the secret of the 
French 75's? 

A. — It seems as if they must have 
learned the secret, but the replacement 
of artillery types during war presents im- 
mense industrial manufacturing problems. 

Q. — How fast can the 75 fire? 

A. — The famous 75 _ will shoot as 
many as 16 shells a minute, and many 
of them have fired 2,000 shells in a single 
day, although they are seldom called upon 
for such an achievement. It keeps 500 
workmen constantly busy to supply one 



102 



Questions and Answers 



of the 75's with shells once it gets into 
action. 

Q. — Is the Ross rifle still used by 
the Canadian troops in France? 

A. — No. Although this rifle had stood 
pre-war tests exceedingly well, Lord 
French in 1915 urged its entire with- 
drawal. It appears, however, to have 
been used till August, 1916, when the 
equipment of Canadian troops with the 
regulation British arm, the Lee-Enfield, 
was begun. 

Q. — Can shell-torn battlefields be 
cultivated ? 

A. — There has been a general belief 
that agricultural lands devastated by shell 
fire will require a decade of cultivation 
to bring them to their former fruitful- 
ness. An American farming expert, how- 
ever, who has given the subject much 
study, and who has personally visited the 
battlefields, says that not only can the 
lands be recovered, but that they can be 
made just as fruitful as ever. 

Q. — What is a communication 
trench ? 

A. — This trench, known by the soldiers 
as "C. T.," is a trench leading back from 
the front or firing line to the rear, as pro- 
tection to those bringing up supplies, etc. 

Q. — What are dug-outs? 

A. — They are the underground shelters 
or caves in the trenches in which soldiers 
on duty may rest, relatively safe from 
the danger of exploding shells or bullets. 
They constitute also a definite part of 
the front-line fortifications, as soldiers 
can be dislodged from such cave-like 
strongholds only by throwing bombs into 
them or employing suffocating gas. 

Q. — Is direct injury achieved by 
artillery fire against enemy 
batteries? 

A. — It has been thought by some that 
the only thing that counts is bombardment 
of the infantry. General Ludendorff, 
Chief of the German General Staff, in a 
report dated October 4, 1917, shows, how- 
ever, that artillery fire against artillery 
positions is a very serious matter. The 
average number of guns lost by a single 
German Army in a single month were 
stated to amount to 1,455, of which 870 
were field guns and 585 heavy pieces. Of 
the total of 1,455 about 655 were lost 
through wear, and 800 through Allied 
bombardments. 



Q. — What is meant by a "Silent 

Susie"? 

A. — A German high explosive shell not 
heard until it bursts. As most of the 
large shells can be both seen and heard, 
because their swift flight makes a loud 
screaming or whistling sound, the "Si- 
lent Susie" is more to be feared than 
some of the others. 

Q. — What is a primer? 

A. — The percussion cap set in the head 
of a cartridge or shell to explode the pro- 
pulsive powder. 

Q. — What is shrapnel? 

A. — Shrapnel is an explosive shell, fired 
like other explosive shells from a rifled 
cannon. But, unlike all other explosive 
shells, which have thick steel walls to 
make their bursting power effective, the 
shrapnel shell is only a thin steel casing 
— a "can," so to speak. The old term 
"cannister" is based on this very fact. 

The shrapnel shell is filled with explo- 
sive like other shells, but, in addition, is 
packed with bullets by the hundreds. A 
time fuse is so adjusted that the shell 
shall explode when it is over a position 
occupied by troops. The bursting of the 
shells drives the bullets in a spreading 
rain of metal with deadly force. 

It is the most savage form of artillery 
attack known against troops that are at 
all in the open. To be truly effective, 
however, it requires extreme accuracy. 

Q. — Why is it called shrapnel? 

A. — It is named for its inventor, a 
British General named Shrapnel, who 
served in the early part of the nineteenth 
century, dying in 1842. 

Q. — Are trench periscopes like sub- 
marine periscopes? 

A. — Very much so, both in principle 
and construction, being a tube, more or 
less long, with prisms and mirrors in it 
which reflect to the observer below the 
image seen by the great glass "eye" at 
the top. The trench periscope, however, 
is easier to hide from the enemy than the 
submarine periscope. It can be erected 
among tree branches, or in similar "cam- 
ouflage" so that no hostile watcher is 
very likely to sight it. Some of the peri- 
scopes are small, but others are giants 
that are moved from place to place on lit- 
tle carts. These monsters have tele- 
scopic tubes, which can be raised so high 
that the observer can look over all sorts 
of obstacles into enemy positions. 



OUR ARMY 



Q. — What officer commands all the 
American war forces? 

A. — No officer can ever have their com- 
mand, because the Constitution of the 
United States makes the President Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy. 
His powers as such are those of military 
command and include, of course, the right 
to dispose the national forces where they 
can be used to best advantage. In the 
War of 1812, in the Mexican War, in the 
Spanish War, in the Boxer rebellion, and, 
recently, in Mexico, American troops were 
thus sent to fight on foreign soil. These, 
however, were all either volunteers or 
regulars. 

Q.— Who is the Chief of Staff of 
the U. S. Army? 

A. — Major-General Peyton C. March 
assumed these duties in March, 1918, after 
Major-General Tasker H. Bliss (who had 
succeeded Major-General Scott in Sep- 
tember, 1917) had gone to Europe to rep- 
resent the United States in the Supreme 
War Council. 

Q. — What was the peace strength 
of the regular army? 

A. — It consisted of 5,014 commissioned 
officers and 92,973 enlisted men, which in- 
cluded about 6,000 so-called Philippine 
Scouts. 

Q. — What was the strength of 
America's army in 1918? 

A. — At the beginning of 1918 the regu- 
lar army consisted of 10,250 officers and 
475,000 enlisted men, the National Guard 
of 10,031 officers and 400,900 enlisted men, 
the National Army of 480,000 men, and 
the reserve of 84,575 officers and 72,750 
enlisted men, a total of 1,539,485 officers 
and men. On June 28, 1918, our total 
army had grown to 2,010,000 enlisted men 
and 160,400 officers. 

Q. — Is there a National Guard or- 
ganization in the U. S. army? 

A. — The National Guard service, ap- 
proximating 300,000 men, was incor- 
porated into Federal service August 5, 
1917- 



Q. — What is the smallest army or- 
ganization? 

A. — The smallest unit or '.'team" in the 
Army is the squad. A squad usually con- 
sists of eight men, one of whom is the 
leader; he is called the "corporal." The 
object of the company commander is to 
make this a permanent unit by putting 
men together who will work well in uni- 
son. 

Two, three, or four squads (usually 
three) may be joined in the next higher 
unit, which is called a "platoon." The 
platoon is not so permanent as a squad, 
but is formed whenever there is need for 
it. 

Q. — How is a company made up? 

A. — The company is made up at full 
strength of 150 men ; this is about 18 
squads or 6 platoons. This number is 
"war strength" in our old tables of or- 
organization ; the first division now in 
France has 200 men per company. It is 
probable the strength may become 250 
per infantry company. Figures for the 
number of squads and of platoons are 
never definitely fixed. A company in 
the field is seldom at full strength, and 
it may be convenient at any time to 
change the numbers of squads and pla- 
toons. 

Q. — What is an army division? 

A. — A division is a group of various 
branches of the Army, making the whole 
body complete in itself — that is, able to 
fight by itself, feed itself, transport its 
supplies, etc. Thus, the American In- 
fantry Division, as organized for modern 
war, has not only infantry, but cavalry, 
artillery, engineers, signal and quarter- 
master corps, medical and sanitary troops 
and supplies, etc. 

It should be noted that in newspaper 
articles the reference to a "division" fre- 
quently means a mere body of men de- 
tached on some special expedition. This 
is not an Army division. It is an expe- 
ditionary force only. But such an expe- 
ditionary force, if operating far away, 
may have all the organization of a divi- 
sion on a miniature scale. 

Q. — How big is an army division? 

A. — A United States Army Infantry 
Division has two infantry brigades (four 
regiments), two machine-gun battalions, 



103 



io4 



Questions and Answers 



two regiments of light artillery, one regi- 
ment of heavy artillery, one trench-mortar 
battery, one extra (divisional) machine- 
gun battalion, one regiment of engineers, 
one field signal battalion with all the 
necessary "trains" for transport. The 
total strength is 887 officers and 26,265 
enlisted men. 

This is much larger than "divisions" 
used to be. The size of divisions in most 
armies used to be about 19,000 men. 

Q. — How many men are in a Brit- 
ish division? 

A. — In pre-war days such a division 
would have been composed of twelve in- 
fantry regiments, nine batteries of 18- 
pounders, two batteries of 5-inch howit- 
zers, three batteries of 4.5-inch heavy bat- 
tery siege guns, ammunition column, two 
field companies and engineers, signal com- 
pany, two mounted infantry companies, 
three field ambulances of sixteen wagons 
each, and a baggage train. In all it 
would consist of 19,111 officers and men, 
6,773 horses, 24 machine guns, 54 field 18- 
pounder guns, 12 howitzers, 4 "long 
Toms," 198 ammunition wagons, 8 motor 
cars, 274 two-horse wagons, 232 four- 
horse wagons, 241 six-horse wagons, 135 
bicycles. In a division in the field to-day 
there would certainly be much more ar- 
tillery, far greater numbers of machine 
guns, and practically all the horse equi- 
page will have been replaced by motors. 

Q. — What is the reason for divid- 
ing an army up into squads, 
regiments, etc.? 

A. — Fundamentally, the same reason 
that leads business men to divide their 
business organizations into various de- 
partments. If an army were in one body, 
it would not only be absolutely unwieldy, 
but the commanding general and his staff 
could not possibly issue orders to it. 

Under the system of dividing it, the 
commander-in-chief is able to issue his 
order to the entire army under him with 
the utmost ease and quickness by simply 
sending the orders to the division com- 
manders. These, in turn, do not need to 
try to reach their entire divisions, which, 
it must be remembered, may be scattered 
oyer many, miles of country. They simply 
give the orders to their brigade com- 
manders, and these transmit the command 
to the regimental headquarters. Thus, 
an army order, instead of needing to be 
passed to thousands of officers, needs to 
be sent to only a very few headquarters, 
and the commanding general always 
knows where these are at a given mo- 
ment. 



Q.— What is a battalion? 

A. — In the American Army it is an 
organized force of about 1,000 men (if 
composed of infantry) — that is, it is not 
a full regiment, but it is a body of men 
formidable in number and yet sufficiently 
compact to be easily handled. 

In former times a battalion was of in- 
terest to army men chiefly as being a con- 
venient and useful administrative unit of 
the army organization ; but in the great 
war it has become one of the very im- 
portant sub-divisions of armies for direct 
fighting. 

The strength of a battalion varies in 
the various armies. Some have expanded 
it so that it is almost as big as a regi- 
ment ; but the best practice appears to be 
the one that has been adopted for the 
fighting organization of the United States. 

Under this system, a battalion of in- 
fantry has 1,000 men under 26 officers, 
the commanding officer being a major. 

The other branches of the service have 
less men in a battalion. 

There are two forms of American ma- 
chine-gun battalions. One has 550 men 
under 20 officers, and it has 36 heavy 
machine guns and 12 spare guns. The 
other form of battalion has 728 men under 
26 officers, and it has 48 heavy machine 
guns and 16 spare guns. 

A brand new type of American battalion 
is the trench-mortar battalion, which has 
757 men under 17 officers. 

Other American battalion strengths are : 
light artillery, 579 men under 17 officers ; 
heavy field artillery, 476 men under 12 of- 
ficers ; engineer battalion, 753 men under 
20 officers. 

Q. — What is an adjutant-general? 

A. — An officer who keeps the records, 
orders, and correspondence of the Army. 
He serves under the direction of the Sec- 
retary of War and of the Chief of Staff. 
Through him and over his name instruc- 
tions and regulations of the War De- 
partment are sent forward to military 
officers and troops. He is at once a sec- 
retary and archivist to the Secretary of 
War, and, to a large extent, rules the legal 
questions of an army. 

Q. — What offenses in the American 
army incur death penalty? 

A. — Eleven offenses are named in the 
regulations. Of these, spying, murder, 
and rape, and sometimes desertion in the 
face of the enemy are punishable by 
hanging. The others are punishable by 
shooting, but the method is left to the 
commanding officers. The lesser offenses 



Our Army 



105 



so punishable are cowardice, in any one 
of a variety of ways ; sleep or drunken- 
ness on sentry post ; desertion or the in- 
citement to or assistance in desertion ; 
attack upon a superior officer or insub- 
ordination ; mutiny or sedition ; mak- 
ing known the countersign ; aiding the 
enemy with ammunition "or any other 
thing," or harboring or giving intelligence 
to the enemy. 

In the offense of "neglect of sentry 
duty," which is a betrayal of responsi- 
bility whose seriousness has made it an 
almost unforgivable crime against mili- 
tary law, the letter of the regulation 
recognizes no difference between being 
asleep and being intoxicated. 

Q. — Is it any excuse for a sleeping 
sentry to plead that he was 
worn out? 

A. — The regulations say distinctly that 
"the fact that the accused had been pre- 
viously overtaxed by excessive guard 
duty is not a defense, although evidence 
to that effect may be received in extenua- 
tion of the offense." The reason for this 
severity is that the sentry who neglects 
his duty may have jeopardized all his 
comrades and perhaps the fate of a bat- 
tle or even a campaign. 

Q. — What is done to a private who 
punches an officer? 

A. — He may be punished by death. He 
certainly will be punished with great se- 
verity. The American Army regulation 
is : 

"Any person subject to military law, 
who, on any pretense whatever, strikes 
his superior officer or draws or lifts up 
any weapon against him, being in the 
execution of his office, or willfully dis- 
obeys any lawful command of his su- 
perior officers, shall suffer death or such 
other punishment as a court-martial may 
direct." 

Q. — What is the difference between 
a brigade and a regiment? 

A. — A brigade is a force made up of 
a number of regiments. An American in- 
fantry brigade, under present conditions, 
contains two infantry regiments and has, 
in addition, a machine-gun battalion. 
Each regiment is commanded by its own 
officers, the commanding officer of each 
being a colonel. The whole is com- 
manded by a general of brigade, better 
known as brigadier-general. 

Brigades in old days often were as 



small as 3,000 men, but with the modern 
increase of regimental strength, an Amer- 
ican infantry brigade, at full war strength, 
has 8,000 men with 232 commissioned of- 
ficers. 

There are, also, brigades of field ar- 
tillery and of cavalry. A field artillery 
brigade has two regiments of light ar- 
tillery, one regiment of heavy artillery, 
and a trench-mortar battery. A cavalry 
brigade consists of three regiments of 
cavalry. Artillery and cavalry brigades 
have about 5,000 men each, counting of- 
ficers. 

Q. — What is meant by a battery? 
Does it mean any number of 
cannon or only a few? 

A. — "Battery" means to the artillery 
what "company" means to the infantry 
regiment— that is, it is the smallest unit 
of the organization, which is commanded 
directly by commissioned officers. 

An American battery of light artillery 
has four 3-inch guns and 193 men under 
5 officers. 

The American battery of heavy field 
artillery has four 6-inch guns, 228 men, 
and five officers. (Of course, there is 
the full_ proportionate number of non- 
commissioned officers, such as sergeants, 
corporals, etc.) 

When two batteries of heavy, or three 
batteries of light, field artillery are com- 
bined, the organization is a battalion, 
and a major commands it. 

Q. — What is the difference between 
commissioned officers and non- 
commissioned ones? 

A— Commissioned officers hold their 
position only by virtue of a commission 
issued to them under authority of the 
President as Commander-in-Chief of the 
Army and Navy. In the old establish- 
ment of the Army, the regular Army of- 
ficers were mostly from West Point, 
with comparatively few officers promoted 
from the ranks or appointed from civil- 
ian life. 

Non-commissioned officers are always 
men selected from the privates, and, 
despite their titles (corporal and ser- 
geant), they remain distinctly of the 
status of privates, in so far as their rank 
compares with that of even the lowest 
commissioned officer. 

They are appointed by the command- 
ing officer of the regiment, usually on 
recommendation of the company com- 
mander. They may be degraded to the 
ranks again, for cause. 



io6 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Do commissioned officers in 
the army not get certain extras 
beside their pay? 

A. — They do. There are standard extra 
allowances for such things as "quarters" 
(meaning rental for living quarters), 
"light" (meaning a stated allowance per 
month for whatever light they need at 
night), "forage" (feed for cavalry 
horses), etc. The schedule of these extra 
allowances is fearfully and wonderfully 
intricate. It has been the subject of in- 
numerable Congress laws and war-depart- 
ment regulations, and old army officers, 
despite all their experience, find it a de- 
cidedly difficult task to figure out just 
how the allowances obtain in given cases. 

Roughly speaking, these extras increase 
the pay of American Army officers by 
about $30 monthly in the case of second 
lieutenants ; $46 for first lieutenants ; $59 
for captains; $73 for majors; $87 for 
lieutenant-colonels; $110 for colonels; 
$114 for brigadier-generals; $127 for 
major-generals. It must be remembered 
that the theory is that these allowances 
are not added pay, but merely allowances 
to meet actual expenses. 

Q. — Is an officer on inactive duty 
entitled to wear his uniform ? 

A. — He may if he desires. He must 
when on active duty. In the days of 
peace, a West Point man considered it 
very much against etiquette to wear his 
uniform at any time except when he was 
on actual duty within army limits. So 
far was this observance carried that of- 
ficers assigned to duties where uniforms 
were obligatory, often carried them in 
suitcases and donned them only on the 
spot where they had to wear them. It 
was a very rare thing, indeed, to see an 
American officer on the streets in uni- 
form. 

Q. — What is a private's first pro- 
motion? 

A. — Promotion to corporal. These are 
usually chosen from the first-class pri- 
vates. Corporals are the squad leaders. 
They are appointed by the commanding 
officer of the regiment on the recom- 
mendation of the commanding officer of 
the company. In addition, each company 
may have one lance corporal, a tem- 
porary appointment made by the com- 
pany commander for the purpose of test- 
ing the ability of some private for per- 
manent appointment. If the lance cor- 
poral does not make a good showing, he 
is returned to the ranks when the com- 
mander sees fit. 



Q. — Is a sergeant the highest non- 
commissioned officer? 

A. — Yes. He is next above the cor- 
poral in rank. There are usually 9 to 11 
sergeants in a company. Unless a ser- 
geant has some other duty assigned to 
him, he is normally the leader of a pla- 
toon. There are, however, many special 
duties assigned to sergeants. The first 
sergeant (in Army slang, the "top ser- 
geant") keeps certain company records, 
forms the company in ranks, transmits or- 
ders from the company commander, and 
performs other important tasks. The 
supply sergeant sees to bringing up sup- 
plies of all kinds to the company. The 
mess sergeant looks after food. The 
stable sergeant is responsible for the care 
of horses and mules. The color sergeant 
carries the colors. There are many other 
grades within the rank of sergeant. 

Q. — What is the pay of American 
privates ? 

Monthly pay. 

Serving Serving 

Rank. in U. S. Abroad. 

Private $30.00 $33.00 

First-class private 33.00 36.60 

Corporal 36.00 40.20 

Sergeant 38.00 44.00 

First sergeant 51.00 60.00 

Q. — Is an army corps a whole army 
by itself? 

A. — It is ; but a still bigger army, known 
as the field army, or simply as "the 
army," may be made of two or many 
more army corps. The "armies" holding 
the European fronts consist of dozens of 
army corps. 

In the United States service an army 
corps is formed by combining two or 
more divisions. Such a corps may con- 
sist of corps headquarters, 6 complete di- 
visions, and special corps troops, includ- 
ing 1 pioneer regiment of infantry, 2 
regiments of cavalry, 1 anti-aircraft ma- 
chine-gun battalion, 1 anti-aircraft artil- 
lery battalion, 1 trench mortar battalion, 
1 field battalion, signal corps, 1 telegraph 
battalion, 1 aero wing, 1 regiment of en- 
gineers, 1 pontoon train, 1 corps artillery 
park, 1 remount depot, I veterinary hos- 
pital, 1 bakery company, 1 supply train, 1 
troop transport train. In addition, 1 ar- 
tillery brigade, 1 sanitary train, and 1 
corps engineer park may be formed from 
detachments from the divisional organiza- 
tions. Its approximate strength is 185,000 
officers and men. 



Our Army 



107 



Q. — How big is an American army 
corps in France? 

A. — In March, 1918, it was decided to 
make an army corps of six divisions in 
order to conform to the "three-line" war- 
fare at the front — two divisions to hold 
a front line, two divisions behind them 
for re-enforcement or replacement, and 
behind them again another two divisions 
for the same purpose. 

Q. — Is a staff officer the member of 
a commanding officer's staff? 

A. — Any officer assigned to the staff of 
a commander, large or small, is known as 
staff officer. But the "staff" of an army 
is far more important and diversified than 
that. The "staff" branches of the army 
are all the branches that are not in the 
three fighting branches, infantry, artillery 
and cavalry. 

There are nine other branches, and 
these are the staff. They are : General 
staff corps, composed of specialists and 
authorities in tactics and strategy; adju- 
tant general's department; judge advo- 
cate general's department ; engineer corps ; 
signal corps ; medical department ; quar- 
termaster corps ; ordnance department. 
The first four contain only officers. The 
others contain officers and specially 
trained enlisted men. 

Q. — Is an army general as big a 
man as a naval admiral? 

A. — He is, in the American service. 
The two ranks compare exactly alike. 
We have, however, had very few soldiers 
of the rank of full General. In fact, we 
have had only four in our whole history 
— Washington, Grant, Sherman and Sher- 
idan. The way the other ranks compare 
is : 

Lieutenant-General Vice-Admiral 

Major-General Rear-Admiral 

Brigadier-General Commodore 

Colonel Captain 

Lieutenant-Colonel Commander 

Major Lieutenant-Commander 

Captain Lieutenant 

First Lieutenant. Lieutenant, junior grade 
Second Lieutenant Ensign 

There are no more Commodores, by the 
way, in active service. It is a title used 
only in the retired list. 

Q. — Why do none of the army of- 
ficers we see wear a sword? 

A. — The sword has gone out of use in 
field service, and officers now wear 



swords only in full-dress parade or on 
full-dress ceremonial occasions. In the 
field, officers carry a revolver or an auto- 
matic pistol for side-arm ; and in actual 
fighting they may or may not use a 
rifle, according to circumstances. 

Q. — How can a young man get into 
West Point? 

A. — Up to 1915 every applicant for 
admission to West Point had to stand 
physical and mental examinations. Since 
1915 a candidate may be admitted with- 
out mental examination on presentation 
of a certificate showing adequate pre- 
paratory training. 

Each Congressman has the naming of 
two, under the last law providing that 
two are to be appointed from each con- 
gressional district, two from each Ter- 
ritory, four from each State at large, 
and 80 from the United States at large. 
The President is authorized to appoint 
cadets from among the enlisted men of 
the United States Army and the National 
Guard, the total number so selected not 
to exceed 180 at any one time. 

Q. — Just what is West Point? 

A. — It is the government training 
school for the officers of the Regular 
Army. The United States Military 
Academy at West Point was established 
by act of Congress in 1802. In 1843 
Congress provided that the corps of 
cadets at the academy should consist of 
one from each congressional district, one 
from each Territory, one from the Dis- 
trict of Columbia, and ten from the 
United States at large, all to be appointed 
by the President of the United States. 
Under this plan, as expanded from time 
to time, the number of authorized cadet- 
ships in 1915 was 706, but in that year 
79 cadetships were unfilled. The act of 
May 4, 1916, authorizes an increase of 
cadetships to 1,332, and provides that 
the increase shall take place in four an- 
nual increments as nearly equal as prac- 
ticable. 

Q. — What officers wear spurs? 

A. — All those entitled to a mount wear 
spurs. 

Q. — What is a soldier's equipment? 

A. — Besides his extra clothing a soldier 
carries a blanket, a rubber poncho, a can- 
teen, a mess kit, including meat can, 
knife, fork, and spoon, a cup, toilet ar- 
ticles, a first-aid package, and some minor 
belongings. 



io8 



Questions and Answers 



One of the most useful pieces is one- 
half of a shelter tent, with rope and 
pins. The shelter tent is said to be a 
French invention which was introduced 
into the American Army during the 
Civil War. In the Army it is often called 
a "dog tent," because of its shape and 
small size. Two men can combine their 
halves and set up a shelter tent in a few 
minutes. While it cannot be described as 
roomy, it is just what its name implies, a 
"shelter" from wind and rain. It is used 
only in temporary camps. 

Each soldier in a modern army car- 
ries with him sufficient food, clothing, 
shelter, fighting arms, and ammunition 
to take care of himself for a short period 
in case he should be separated from his 
comrades. 

Q. — What weight must an Ameri- 
can infantryman carry? 

A. — The total weight of his load, in 
addition to the clothes he wears, is 50 to 
70 pounds. The number of articles is 
surprisingly large. They are so devised, 
however, that by ingenious methods of 
packing and adjusting they can all be 
carried with the least possible effort. 
This load is much lighter than that of the 
Germans and the French. It is probably 
the lightest weight equipment in any 
army. 

Q. — How many cartridges does a 
soldier carry? 

A. — The amount of ammunition which 
an American infantryman carries into 
battle is usually 220 rounds. In an ad- 
vanced firing position, where it is diffi- 
cult to bring up reserves of ammunition, 
it is necessary to shoot with care not to 
waste cartridges. 

Q. — Do all soldiers carry entrench- 
ing outfits? 

A. — All infantrymen do. In modern 
warfare the intrenching tool is a posi- 
tively vital part of fighting equipment. 
The eight men in each squad carry 8 
tools : 4 shovels, 2 pick mattocks, 1 polo 
or hand ax, and I wire cutter. In ordi- 
nary soil they can quickly throw up a 
shallow trench which will protect to a 
great extent from the enemy's fire. After 
a trench has once been started, it can be 
deepened and extended, even in the face 
of the enemy, without the soldier expos- 
ing himself to direct fire. 



Q. — What is the soldier's first work 
in the morning? 

A. — The soldier must get up about 6 
o'clock, a little earlier in summer and a 
little later in winter. The buglers sound 
the call known as reveille. The men 
dress and fall in. 

The first thing is military drill which 
consists of "setting-up exercises," and 
occupies the first few minutes of the day. 
They consist of certain exercises of the 
head, arms, trunk, and legs, designed not 
merely to develop muscles but also to in- 
crease skill, control of the body, and self- 
reliance. 

Then comes "washing up" and break- 
fast. Usually breakfast is followed by a 
half-hour for cleaning the barracks and 
bunks and putting clothing and bedding 
in order. Frequently the company com- 
mander will inspect the barracks imme- 
diately to make sure that every man has 
attended to his part of the work. There 
is then often some time which the soldier 
uses for attending to his personal needs, 
tidying up his clothing, and the like. 

The remaining two or three hours of 
the morning are likely to be spent in 
drill, at first in "close order" and later in 
"extended order" also. During the drill 
there are numerous short periods of rest. 

In most camps guard mounting comes 
about noon. This consists of relieving 
the men who have been guarding the 
camp and turning over this duty to new 
men. Each soldier mounts guard not 
oftener than once a week, unless he is 
ordered to double duty as punishment. 

Q. — Are soldiers in camp kept busy 
all day? 

A. — They are, in training camps and in 
garrison. After guard mounting the men 
go to dinner, which comes at 12 o'clock. 
At least one hour is always allowed for 
dinner and rest. 

During the afternoons the work is 
varied to include additional setting-up 
exercises and other drills, target prac- 
tice and bayonet exercises. About 5 
o'clock comes the evening parade and 
"retreat," when the flag is lowered or 
furled for the night. The band plays 
"The Star Spangled Banner," while all 
officers and soldiers stand at attention. 

Supper comes between 5 and 6 o'clock 
and is followed by a period of rest. _ Taps 
are sounded by 10 o'clock. This is the 
signal to put out all lights, retire, and 
keep quiet. 



U.S. ARMY— INSIGNIA OF RANK 



COLLAR INSIGNIA 
Enlisted Men 



COLLAR INSIGNIA 
Officers 



V 



Worn in connection with, 
collar insignia of service 
on both sides of blouse or 
. shirt collar. 





Cap Device 

Commissioned Officers 

U. S. Army 




Worn on right collar of 
blouse or shirt with insig- 
nia of branch of service on 
left collar. 



COMMISSIONED OFFICERS SHOULDER LOOPS 




General Lieutenant Major Brigadier Colonel Lieutenant Major Captain First Second 

General General GeneTal Colonel ,• Lieutenant Lieutenant 

(Silver.) (Gold) (Silver) (Gold) 



EMBLEMS OF CORES AND DEPARTMENTS OF THE U.S.ARMY 

Worn on collars of Commissioned Officers, Also worn as buttons on. collars, of Enlisted Men t 




Medical 
Department 



Chaplain 



.ludge 

(Engineer Quartermaster s Advocate 
Corps Department Oen'l's Dep't. 



Signal, Chemical Warfare Ordnance 
Corps Service ■ Corps 




Infantry^" 



INSIGNIA OF THE ARMY AVIATION SERVICE 




Ch. Pharmacist 



Ch. Pharmacist 



U. S. ARMY-INSIGNIA 

CHEVRONS AND SPECIALTY MARKS" 

Worn on blonse or shirt sleeves of Enlisted "Men 




fea^i BSS 




Regimental Regimental Battalion Color First Company Ordnance Sergeant Corporal 

Sergeant Supply . Sergeant Sergeant, Sergeant Supply Sergeant 
Jlajor Sergeant Major Sergeant "* 




Quartermaster. 


Master 


Master 


Master 


Engineer 1 


Master 


Ch.Mechanic 


Sergeant 


Electrician 


Engineer 


Hospital 
Sergeant 


Coast 
Artillery 


Gunner' 


.Field 
Artillery 




o 

Carrier Mess 



FIELD AND. COAST ARTILLERY 



>Horseshoer. 




Wagoner 



Mechanic^ '. Bandsman JBugler Eigure of Gun 

t Merit Commander 










First Class 


Second Class 


First Class 


Second Class. 


Gun or 


Gun or 


Gunner- 


Gunner 


Mortar Co. 


Mortar, Co. 


Mine Cq» 


Mine Co, 



Cook 



UNITED STATES NAVY 



Marines 



CAP DEVICES 

Navy Navy 

Commissioned Officer Warrant Officer 



Navy 
Chief Petty Officer 







Navy 



ENLISTED MEN 
Naval Militia 



Naval Reserve 



On ribbon 
TJJiSt -AND NAME OF VESSEL 



On ribbon 

NAVAL MILITIA. 



On ribbon. 
NAVAL RESERVE FORCE 



SERVICE COAT COLLAR DEVICES— NAVY 

(Marines show rant on shoulder loop as in Army.)' 
LINE OFFICERS 



Admiral of the Navy 



Admiral 



Vice Admiral 



Rear Admiral 






Captain 



Commander 
Silver Leaf 



Lieutenant Commander 
Gold Leaf 



Lieutenant 



Lieutenant Junior Grade, 



Ensign 



STAFF OFFICERS 
Same as equal rank of line officers, but corps devices appear in place of anchors 

CORPS DEVICES 



m? 



\ 



Pay- 



Prof. 31 ath. 



Kavul Civil Dental 

Constructor Engineer Officer 

CHIEF WARRANT OFFICERS, WARRANT OFFICERS. MATES 



Chaplain 




s^V 




Ch. Boatswain Ch. Gunner Ch. Machinist. Ch. Carpenter Ci.SailmakerCh. Pharmacist 
Boatswain 



Midship- 



Gunner Machinist Carpenter Sailmalter p h ft ^ aci3t p a y m a S ^e"s Clerk™ 1 " 1 



NAVY— INSIGNIA OF RANK 

COMMISSIONED AND CHIEF WARRANT OFFICERS' SHOULDER LOOPS 

(Worn with White Summer Service Uniform) 



Admiral 



Vice Rear 

Admiral Admiral 



Captain Commander 



Lieutenant 
Commander 



Lieutenant 



Lieutenant . ■ Chief Warrant Officers 

Junior Grade E DS1 2n, Chaplam. Boatswain Gunner. Machinist 

All Naval Reserve Officers, serving on ships of the line, transports and supply vessels, wear same 

stripes as line officers of Navy but with a gold anchor on shoulder loop in place of gold star. 
Officers on shore duty, scout patrol and similar craft wear the stripes without star or anchor. 
Staff officers wear same stripes but with corps device in place of star. 

CHIEF PETTY OFFICERS SHOULDER LOOPS 



Gunner 



Boatswain 



Carpenter 



Warrant Mat0 Pay 

Machinist Clerk 

SLEEVE MARKS OF COMMISSIONED AND WARRANT OFFICERS NAVY. 

Staff officers same stripes, but instead of stars, corps colors are used with stripes. 
Corps colorsi Medical, maroon; Pay, white; Prof. Math., olive green; Civil Eng., blue; 
Med. Res., crimson; Dental, orange. 
LINE OFFICERS 




HG 




Captain Commander Lieutenant L i eu t e nant 
Commander 






Lieutenant 
Junior 



Ensign. 



Midshipman 
1st Class 



Midshipman 
2nd Class 



Ch. Boatswain Ch. Carpenter 
Ch.Gunner Ch.Sailtnakor 
Ch.Machinist Ch.Phararucist 
Naval Reserve Officers of the line wear gold anchor in place of star. 
All other officers wear stripes without star or anchor. 
RATINGS AND A FEW SPECIALTY MARKS NAVY 



Boatswain 

Gunner 

Machinist 

Mate 







Boatswain's Mate 
Coxswain 



Carpenter's Mate 

Plumber 

Eitter, Painter 



Turret 
Captain. 





Gunner's Mate 



Storekeeper 



Yeoman 



Electrician Machinist's Mate Hospital Corps 



n 




m 




w 







to 




o 
















< 









N 




IDENTIFICATION OF FIGHTING MEN 



Q. — How are our soldiers identi- 
fied? 

A. — A "Statistical Division" with a for- 
eign branch in Paris takes care of this. 
Every man in the Army, whether officer 
or private, is indexed by name, and the 
records filed in alphabetical order for im- 
mediate reference, should the names ap- 
pear either in Army orders or casualty 
lists. With the description of each sol- 
dier is given the name of his next of kin 
with emergency address. 

Each soldier wears about his neck and 
underneath his clothing a small tag giv- 
ing his name and company. The foreign 
branch of the Statistical Division has the 
fighting forces listed by regiments, as 
well as alphabetically. Whenever the 
names of soldiers figure in official 
dispatches, duplicate sets of records kept 
at Washington will afford quick refer- 
ence. 

Q. — How are our sailors identi- 
fied? 

A. — Every officer and enlisted man in 
the United States Navy wears a metal 
identification tag which bears the wear- 
er's name, the date of his birth and en- 
listment, and, in the case of an officer, 
his rank and date of appointment. On 
the other side is etched the finger print 
of his right index finger. This is a part 
of what naval officers regard as the best 
system of identification known, superior 
to that in use in European armies and 
navies. 

Q. — What is the identification tag? 

A. — The identification tag consists of 
an oval plate of monel metal 1.25 by 1.50 
inches, perforated at one end and suspend- 
ed from the neck by a monel wire encased 
in a cotton sleeve. A copy of each finger 
print on paper is supplied to the Bureau 
of Navigation, Navy Department, where 
it is filed in the identification section, this 
particular work being in charge of J. H. 
Taylor, finger-print expert, who devised 
the tag adopted. 

Q. — What is monel metal? 

A. — Monel is the alloy used for battle- 
ship propellers. It was chosen in prefer- 
ence to brass or any other metal because 
it is unaffected by heat, not melting until 
it has reached a temperature of 2,480 de- 



grees Fahrenheit. It will not corrode, and 
is not affected by salt water. On each 
ship and at each naval station a hospital- 
corps officer has charge of the prepara- 
tion of the tags. 

Q. — How are finger-prints taken? 

A. — The finger-print is taken in ink 
on the metal. The name and dates are 
then written on the tag, which is sprinkled 
with powdered asphaltum and held over 
an alcohol lamp until the asphaltum melts 
into the ink. The tag is then placed for 
an hour in a nitric-acid bath, which etches 
the finger-print and inscription on the 
metal. 

Q. — What is the chance of mis- 
takes ? 

A. — There is not one chance in 65,000,- 
000, the finger-print experts estimate, of 
a mistake in identification, as there are 
65 characteristics in each finger and only 
one chance in 1,000,000 of the fingers of 
any two persons having the same char- 
acteristics. 

Q. — Are our soldiers not numbered, 
also? 

A. — The War Department has decided 
to assign a number to each enlisted man 
in the armies of the U. S. These num- 
bers (beginning at No. 1 and continuing 
without limit and without alphabetical pre- 
fix or affix) will be stamped on the metal 
identification tags now worn by the sol- 
diers. 

Q. — How does France tag her sol- 
diers? 

A. — France uses a German-silver iden- 
tification tag for each soldier. It was 
intended to be worn on a string about the 
neck and hidden under the shirt, but the 
majority of "poilus" prefer to wear the 
tag on a chain about the wrist. In 1915 
it was decided to provide two tags, so 
that for identification purpose, one was 
to be removed by the authorities and the 
other was to remain on the body for fu- 
ture identification. 

Q. — Are the British tagged? 

A. — The British Tommy, at the begin- 
ning of the war, wore a circular aluminum 
tag hanging on a string about his neck, 



114 



Identification of Fighting Men 



"5 



containing his draft number, initials, 
name, regiment and religion. Owing to 
the scarcity of aluminum, it was decided 
in November, 1916, to adopt a new sys- 
tem. It consists of two tags, one octag- 
onal and red, the other round and green, 
and suspended from the first. In case 
of death, the green tag is removed and 
the red one left for future identification. 
The Belgians, in 1915, adopted the 
French model, fastened to the wrist by 
a chain bracelet. 

Q. — What is the Italian system? 

A. — The Italian identification tag 
(adopted in 1915) consists of an ornate 
book-like locket, containing a folded 
paper record suspended on a string around 
the neck. This record gives the wearer's 
full name, military class, recruiting dis- 
trict, names of parents, residence of im- 
mediate family, regiment, vaccination rec- 
ords and wounds. 

The Serbian soldier, in the beginning 
of the war, used an identification tag 
which was simply a metal plate sewed on 
the inside of his tunic. This method has 
now been replaced by the French identi- 
fication tag. 

Q. — Were Russian soldiers tagged? 

A. — With the exception of those Rus- 
sians who fought in France, no identifi- 
cation tags were provided for the Rus- 
sian soldiers. Hundreds of thousands of 
fallen Russians, therefore, never have 
been identified, and untold misery and 
countless legal tangles have ensued be- 
cause Russia failed to provide these in- 
expensive tags. 

Q. — When did Germany first tag 
soldiers ? 

A. — In 1870, in the Franco-Prussian 
War. Germany entered the present war 
with the same tag that it had used then. 
This tag contained the numbers of the 
army corps, the regiment, the company 
and the draft. It was worn on a string 
around the neck. Sometimes a leather 
pouch protected it. 



Q. — Do the Germans still use the 
same tag? 

A. — No. In June, 1915, a more com- 
plete tag of larger dimensions and oval 
in shape was adopted. It carried the 
names, residence, dates of birth, mobili- 
zation data, and a number of numerals 
and letters. 

In November, 1916, still another model 
was adopted by the German Army. It 
was even larger than the preceding one, 
and made in a split form. The two 
halves, one the duplicate of the other, 
are separated by a serrated line, which 
makes it easy to detach one half of the 
identification tag, while the other half 
remains on the body of the fallen sol- 
dier. 

The Turks use a round tag of metal 
carrying the name, first name, and regi- 
mental number of the soldier, while the 
Austrians use a locket similar to that^of 
the Italians. This is worn on a string 
which the soldier wears around his neck. 



Q. — How are the Chinese soldiers 
drafted and tagged? 

A. — They are first put through a thor- 
ough physical examination by the Brit- 
ish or French surgeon — an event in the 
Chinaman's life, who, probably, has never 
seen a European physician before. 

As all Chinese look alike to the Euro- 
pean officers who are to control him later, 
they simply must have a ready and sure 
means of identification. A steel brace- 
let with his number engraved upon it 
is marked with other data about the sol- 
dier in the official records. This brace- 
let is riveted about the owner's wrist, 
and none other than a blacksmith can re- 
move it. 

His queue is next shaved off by a bar- 
ber (for the sum of eight cents), and the 
celestial is treated to the surprise of his 
life. He gets a bath, and a brand-new 
suit of soldier clothes. He is ready then 
to go aboard the transport with all his 
belongings in a huge bundle on his back. 



THE PRISONER OF WAR 



Q. — What did we do about Ameri- 
can prisoners in Germany? 
A. — We arranged an American-German 
conference on prisoners of war and their 
treatment, to be held in Berne during 
autumn, 1918, under the presidency of the 
Swiss Government, to discuss compensa- 
tion, care and treatment as well as ex- 
change under certain conditions. 

Q. — Who were the American dele- 
gates ? 

A. — The American delegates as ap- 
pointed August, 1918, were : John W. 
Garrett, American Minister to the Nether- 
lands, Chairman of the delegation; Major 
Gem F. J. Kernan, U. S. A.; John W. 
Davis, Solicitor General of the United 
States; Captain H. H. Hough, U. S. N. ; 
Commander Raymond Stone, U. S. N. 

Assistant delegates were : Ellis Loring 
Dresel, War Trade Board representative 
in Switzerland ; Christian A Herter, spe- 
cial assistant in the Department of State, 
secretary of the delegation ; Colonel 
Ulysses S. Grant, 3d., U. S. A. ; Colonel 
Samuel G. Shartle, U. S. A. ; Charles 
Moouefield Storey, attorney in the De- 
partment of Justice; Major James H. 
Perkins, Commissioner of the American 
National Red Cross. Lewellyn N. Snow- 
den was appointed to accompany the dele- 
gation as special disbursing officer, and 
Clinton E. MacEachran as confidential 
clerk. 

Q. — Who had been looking after 
our prisoners up to that time? 

A. — The American government and the 
Red Cross in conjunction. By arrange- 
ment with the enemy, a Red Cross com- 
mission in Switzerland was enabled to 
send regular consignments of clothing, 
food and other comforts to American 
prisoners of war. 

Q. — Was there anybody in Ger- 
many to look after them? 

A. — Yes. The Spanish Minister in Ger- 
many was charged with our interests and 
he appointed members of his staff to visit 
and inspect prison camps where Ameri- 
cans were. 



pris- 



cans were. 

Q. — How many Americans are 
oners? 

A. — Up to July, 1918, the number was 
about 500. 



Q. — How were they treated? 

A. — Major Robert S. Browne, U. S. 
Medical Corps, who had been in Switzer- 
land with the Red Cross to look after pris- 
oners, was reported in the newspa'pers on 
September 3, 1918, as saying that they 
were being treated fairly well. 

Q. — Is a prisoner of war a convict? 

A. — His status is absolutely and specific- 
ally different from that of a convict. A 
soldier who is captured in honorable war- 
fare is entitled to treatment that entails 
neither stigma nor avoidable hardship. 

Theoretically, the captor has the right 
only to imprison him and hold him safe 
so that he shall not become a menace. In 
practice, however, the belligerents erect 
so many safeguards and regulations that 
the quality of treatment ranges widely, 
according to the character of those in 
command of the various camps. 

A prisoner of war, for instance, re- 
mains a man who must submit to all mili- 
tary regulations, and who is as subject to 
discipline and military law as if he were 
in his own army. A stern commander 
who is severe with his own men naturally 
would be a pretty harsh commander of a 
prisoner camp. 

Q. — Did the American Ambassador 
visit German war-prisoner 
camps before we entered war? 

A. — The American Embassy made regu- 
lar and stated inspections of all the camps 
in Germany, under arrangement with the 
German Government. In this duty the 
Americans did not represent the United 
States. They represented Great Britain, 
v/hose interests the Americans had taken 
over when war began. Everything was 
inspected, the men were questioned, and 
full detailed reports were made out. 

Q. — Are all the prison camps in 
Germany equally as bad? 

A. — Some of the German camps, as is 
proved by the very exact and carefully 
considered report of Professor Daniel J. 
McCarthy, who conducted the work of 
inspection for the American Embassy, 
were frightfully bad — not _ merely bad 
from a sanitary and physical point of 
view, but equally bad because of the bru- 



Il6 



The Prisoner of War 



117 



tality of the officers and soldiers in charge. 
Others were much better. 

Thus, such camps as Friedrichsfeld, Sol- 
tau, Parchim, Dulmen, Wahn, Wunsdorf, 
and many others, were considered by him 
as very good indeed. The camps of Min- 
den, Limburg, Wittenberg, Schneidemuhl, 
Langensalzen, etc., were very bad — "the 
difference between heaven, relatively, and 
hell, absolutely," as Dr. McCarthy put it. 

He added that it was difficult to esti- 
mate the exact proportions of good and 
bad camps, and that "one might say that 
taking the problem as a whole, and for the 
majority of the camps, it was fairly well 
administered." This judgment, however, 
had to be qualified because of the many 
less satisfactory aspects presented by the 
huge problem of many thousand scat- 
tered working camps, many of them being 
highly unsatisfactory. 

Q. — What were the differences be- 
tween the various camps? 

A. — In the best type of concentration, 
or "parent" camp, the prisoners were or- 
ganized on a military basis under their 
own noncommissioned officers, who were 
responsible for discipline, behavior, and 
clothing and, in some cases, were in charge 
of the kitchen as well. In the majority 
of camps, however, such a complete or- 
ganization was not permitted; in many 
camps a partial organization was made, 
with some authority for the noncommis- 
sioned officers; in others the prisoners 
were treated simply as criminals, without 
any rights, and were guarded at the point 
of the bayonet by men who were allowed 
to use almost any degrree of brutality in 
enforcing their commands. 

Q. — To what was the difference in 
camps due? 

A. — The fact that the army corps com- 
mander was practically supreme, and that 
he handed over the complete charge of 
the prison camp to the camp commandant, 
who was often of the same rank as him- 
self, gave opportunity for very good treat- 
ment, as it gave freedom for very bad, 
of prisoners of war. Dr. McCarthy 
quotes the saying that was general 
throughout Germany, "Everything depends 
on the commandant." To a great extent 
he says, that was literally true. 

Q. — What was Dr. McCarthy's 
general verdict on the German 
prison camps? 

A. — There were so many various as- 
pects that he could not make a summing- 
up that would be comprehensive. He 



says that he found prisons appallingly 
bad, and he found prisons really good: 
commandants and guards who were brutal, 
and others who were considerate, kind, 
and intelligent. Some working camps 
were bad, some satisfactory. 

As an outstanding example of a bad 
camp; Dr. McCarthy describes that at 
Minden, which was one of the worst in 
Germany, and whose conditions he found 
not only bad but "inexcusable." 

One of the best of the "parent" camps 
was that at Friedrichsfeld, which had 
been remodeled, Dr. McCarthy explains, 
"so as to make it comfortable. There 
was a splendid organization of the camp 
and every effort was being made to make 
the men comfortable, guard their health, 
give them mental and physical relaxation, 
and to refit them for more useful work 
in the future." 

Q. — How large were the German 
prison camps? 

A. — Most, camps were built to hold 
from ten to twelve thousand men, but 
some were much larger. The big camp 
at Parchim held forty thousand men in 
1916. 

Q. — Did a big force guard the big 
number of prisoners? 

A. — The German practice was to have 
a guard about one-tenth in strength of 
the number of prisoners. This guard con- 
sisted usually of men who had been in 
the army, but were too old for active 
service, or else of young men physically 
unfit for service in the field. 

Barbed wire divided most of the camps 
into blocks of buildings, and thus pre- 
vented any concerted action by the whole 
number of prisoners, even if there had 
not been constant watchfulness. In ad- 
dition, every prison camp was over- 
looked by many towers with platforms 
armed with medium-caliber cannon. Thus 
the prisoners were quite helpless. 

Q. — How many prison camps are 
there in Gemany? 

A. — About 150, counting in big and lit- 
tle. There were 105 big camps for pris- 
oners of war alone in 1916. In addition 
to these, which contained the enlisted men 
and noncommissioned officers, there were 
many smaller camps for officers. Then 
there were three great camps for interned 
civilians, and there was at least one camp 
for reserve officers. These were only the 
actual prison or concentration camps. 



n8 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Were these prison camps the 
only ones in Germany? 

A. — No. Those were only the concen- 
tration or parent camps. As the prison- 
ers of war were assigned to labor, they 
went to so-called working camps — camps 
attached to mines, factores, reclamation 
projects, etc. In one district alone there 
were 18,000 of these working camps at 
the period when the American Embassy 
made regular inspections. 

Q. — Did prisoners work with 
enough willingness to make it 
worth while? 

A. — The tedium of prison often made 
men want to work. In addition, most of 
them were employed in agricultural labor, 
and the prisoners soon discovered that 
the rural population was inclined to treat 
them comparatively well. 

As Professor McCarthy reported : "The 
distinction between the German people 
and the German Government was here 
very manifest. The prisoner of war, work- 
ing in the fields with his employer, eating 
at the same table and often housed in the 
same house, lost the character of a hated 
enemy — the British and French prisoners 
were, as a. rule, popular with their farmer 
employes and their families and, when 
well treated, made excellent workmen. 
The prisoner rarely attempted to escape, 
and rarely requested to be returned to the 
parent camp." 

Spaking of 1916, Dr. McCarthy said 
that the efficiency of war-prisoners in 
agricultural work reached certainly 80 per 
cent. It was less in industry, but, in a 
general way, the efficiency throughout ap- 
peared to range between 50 and 75 per 
cent. 

Q. — Who keeps prison camps 
clean? The captor Govern- 
ment? 

A. — No. It is the duty of the prisoners 
of war to keep their camps clean as the 
daily routine of their duty. Regulations 
prescribe what they shall do and how they 
shall do it, just as if they were in their 
own army. They must also do any other 
work around the camp, such as road-mak- 
ing, erecting fences and barbed-wire lines, 
etc. 

Q. — How are prisoners punished 
in a prison camp? 

A. — Prisoners of war who disobey or- 
ders or commit offenses lay themselves 
liable to trial, and they may be punished 



according to the regulations and laws of 
the country that holds them. Such pun- 
ishment in serious cases such as mutiny, 
assaulting guards or assaulting fellow- 
prisoners, may go even so far as death. 
Other serious offenses may be punished 
by terms of imprisonment. The offender 
then ceases to be a prisoner of war, and 
becomes a convict. 

Q. — Can war-prisoners be legally 
compelled to work? 

A. — Yes. The Hague Convention of 
1809 (signed by Great Britain and Ger- 
many) says : "The State may utilize the 
labor of prisoners of war according to 
their rank and aptitude. These tasks shall 
not be excessive, and shall have nothing 
to do with military operations." 

Prisoners may be authorized to work 
for the public service, for private persons, 
or on their own account. 

Work done for the State must be paid 
according to the tariffs in force for sol- 
diers of the national army employed in 
similar tasks. 

When the work is for other branches 
of the public service or for private per- 
sons, the conditions must be settled in 
agreement with the military authorities. 

The wages of the prisoners shall go 
towards improving their position, and the 
balance shall be paid them at the time of 
their release, after deducting the cost of 
their maintenance. 

Q. — What happens to a prisoner 
who refuses to work? 

A. — Article 8 of the Hague Convention 
says : 

"Prisoners of war shall be subject to 
the laws in the army of the State into 
whose hands they have fallen. Any act 
of insubordination warrants the adoption, 
as regards them, of such measures 
of severity as may be necessary." 

Q. — Can they be set to forced la- 
bor? 

A. — Yes. They may be set to forced 
labor, the only big condition being that 
they must not be set to wr>>k directly at 
military labor such as munition-making, 
etc. 

Q. — What did our troops do with 
their German prisoners? 

A. — They transferred them to points 
distant from the front and set them to 
work at repairing roads and other labor 
permissible under the Hague conventions. 



The Prisoner of War 



119 



Q. — Where did Serbia put her 60,- 
000 Austrian prisoners? 

A. — It was reported when von Macken- 
sen began his drive from Belgrade that 
all the Austrian prisoners had been re- 
moved to Corsica, but, in view of the 
immense difficulty the Serbians them- 
selves experienced in getting across the 
Albanian Mountains, it is pretty safe to 
assume that they took few, if any, prison- 
ers away with them. As these Austrians, 
practically unguarded, were scattered all 
over Serbia, it is probable that most of 
them rejoined the Austrian Army after 
the invasion. 

Q. — Are German prisoners being 
used as laborers in England? 

A. — According to early 1918 statements 
in the House of Commons, there were 84,- 
000 German prisoners in British hands. 
A good number of these are used in road- 
making and quarrying. Recently the 
Bucklow Union Committee of the Ches- 
shire War Agricultural Committee applied 
for prisoners of war for service on the 
land. Experienced men were to be paid 
£1 ($5) a week, men without experience 
15s. ($3-75). Others are employed in 
making mail bags, being paid 6d (12 cents) 
a bag. 

Some of the civilian prisoners, also, are 
engaged in making mail bags, others are 
employed in quarrying, and it is planned 
to employ them in clearing forest areas 
in the near future. 

Q. — Did the German prisoners re- 
fuse to work? 

A. — It was announced in the House of 
Commons that German prisoners of war 
had refused to continue quarry work un- 
less they received increased pay and ra- 
tions. It was further stated, however, 
that disciplinary action having been taken, 
the prisoners resumed work. 

In the annual reports of several of the 
larger coal and iron companies reference 
is made to the fact that German prison- 
ers are being used. In one of these, 
with headquarters at Middlesborough, be- 
tween three hundred and four hundred 
German prisoners are utilized, and the 
Chairman of Directors stated : "Our man- 
agement are thoroughly satisfied with the 
experiment, and the men themselves seem, 
on the whole, to prefer regular employ- 
ment with the allowance they can earn 
rather than the enforced idleness of a 
prisoners' camp. During the past month, 
however, at one of our quarries, they 
struck work, but steps being promptly 



taken to reduce the rations seem to have 
brought them to their senses, and I under- 
stand most are back at work again." 

Q. — What British representatives 
attended the Anglo-German 
Hague Conference on prison- 
ers of war? 

A. — Six delegates from Great Britain 
with Sir Robert Younger for chairman 
and Lord Newton as next in rank. One 
of the remaining four was Mrs. Darley 
Livingstone, the first woman to sit in a 
diplomatic negotiation between nations. 
She is an American, married to a British 
officer, and has been member and honor- 
ary secretary of the Government Commit- 
tee (English) on the Treatment of British 
Prisoners by the Enemy. She is said 
to have more information and knowledge 
on the subject of British prisoners of war 
in all its details than any other person 
in the empire. 

Q. — How many civilians were in- 
terned? 

A. — There were at the end of May, 1017, 
3,600 British civilians interned in German 
prison camps, and 32,274 German civilians 
interned in British camps. 

Q. — How many prisoners of war 
are there in Germany? 

A. — August I, 1916, the German Gov- 
ernment gave out the following official 
figures : 

Officers. Men. 

French 5,047 348,731 

Russian 9,019 1,202,871 

Belgian 656 4i,75i 

British 947 29,956 

Serbian 22,914 

This made a total of 1,646,223, ex- 
clusive of the 15,669 officers, up to that 
time, and it appears to have been con- 
sidered correct by the American rep- 
resentatives who visited the war-prisons 
for the British Government. 

Q. — How many prisoners have the 
Germans taken since? 

A. — Lord Newton, Minister in charge 
of prisoners in Great Britain, stated on 
February 6, 1917, that he estimated the 
Germans held 1,500,000 Russians, 400,000 
French, 50,000 Belgians, and 35,000 Brit- 
ish. According to that, the Germans 
would have captured 300,000 Russians, 
44,000 French, 8,000 Belgians, and 4,000 
British between August, 1916, and Feb- 
ruary, 1917. 



120 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What was the British figure at 
the end of 1917? 

A.— The British War Office, on Dec. 
29, 1917, announced that the number of 
British prisoners held by the enemy, in- 
cluding those in Switzerland, totaled 46,- 
712. The prisoners include members of 
the regular army, territorial forces, Royal 
Navy and naval division, held in the fol- 
lowing countries : In Germany, 43,609 ; in 
Turkey, 2,299 : m Bulgaria, 628 ; and in 
Austria, 86. There are 2,257 officers and 
44,455 men. 

This statement, compared with Lord 
Newton's figures of February, 1917, would 
indicate that between those dates the Ger- 
mans had taken about 8,000 more men on 
the western front. 

Q. — What was the total number of 
war-prisoners after two years 
of war? 

A. — It seems to have totaled about 
4,175,000 men, taking all armies to- 
gether. Of these, the Central Powers had 
by far the most, probably holding at 
least 1,700,000 more men than the Allies 
— the big difference being due largely to 
their great captures of Russians. 

Q. — What prisoners did the Allies 
hold in 1917? 

A. — The Russians claim to have taken 
prisoner some 1,500,000 Austrians and 
Germans, but they never gave exact fig- 
ures. The total German losses in prison- 
ers and missing, according to their state- 
ment of last August, was 400,000. It is 
assumed that the French held something 
like 150,000. The British had 58,000, and 
the Russians presumably had the rest. 
The Italians claimed to have captured 
about 40,000 Austrians. If we add these 
approximate figures together we get the 
following result: 

In England 58,000 

In France 150,000 

In Italy 40,000 

In Russia 1,000,000 

Total 1,248,000 



Q. — What prisoners did Germany's 
allies hold in 1916? 

A. — According to the German report, 
after two years' war the Austrians held 
781,566 Russians. They soon added to 
that total, and it would be perfectly safe 
to put it down as 800,000; if we do this, 
and include the Italians, we get the fol- 
lowing totals : 

In Germany (Lord Newton's es- 
timate) 1,985,000 

In Austria — Russians . . 800,000 
Italians . . . 50,000 
Serbians . . . 40,000 

890,000 

In Bulgaria 38,000 

In Turkey 14,000 

Total 2,927,000 

Q. — How many prisoners had the 
Austrians in 1918? 

A. — According to the German official 
reports, the Austrians had 890,000 prison- 
ers in 1916. They have, of course, added 
heavily to that total since then. There 
has been the big drive into Italy, which 
added heavily to the number of Italian 
prisoners and, after that, the drive 
through the Ukraine. It may be assumed 
that the Austrians hold well over 1,000,- 
000 prisoners. 

Q. — Where did Turkey get her 
prisoners ? 

A. — Turkey has, among others, all of 
General Townshend's army, which sur- 
rendered at Kut near Bagdad. Few pris- 
oners were taken at Gallipoli. 

Q. — What was the fate of Ameri- 
cans taken in the trench raids 
in November? 

A— In February, 1918, six of the twelve 
missing men were reported as being pris- 
oners in the German prison camp of 
Tuchel, West Prussia. The report showed 
that with these six were two others, who 
had been captured in a later raid. 



CASUALTIES OF WAR 



Q. — Are the losses in this war 
really greater than ever be- 
fore? 

A. — That was the general belief, and 
the news dispatches told almost daily of 
appalling numbers of dead after even a 
small engagement. However, in 1917, 
the Committee on Public Information 
(Washington) made the following state- 
ment: 

"There is probably little basis for the 
idea that the number of casualties in this 
war is any greater, in proportion to the 
number of men engaged, than in previous 
wars. In the French Army during the 
last six months of 1916 (which included 
three big offensives), the total losses in 
killed, wounded, and prisoners are offi- 
cially reported to have been only 1.28 per 
cent of the French forces under arms." 

Secretary of War Baker said, on Nov. 
10, 1917: 

"Up to about June 1, the losses of the 
British expeditionary forces in deaths in 
action and deaths from wounds were 
about 7 per cent of the total of all men 
sent to France since the beginning of the 
war. It may be added that the ratio of 
losses of this character to-day, because 
of improved tactics and the swiftly 
mounting Allied superiority in artillery, 
is less than seven to every hundred men." 

Q. — How did the various Govern- 
ments report their losses? 

A. — Each Government organized a big 
staff of accountants who received the de- 
tailed lists of dead and wounded from 
the front, arranged them, and sent official 
notifications to the nearest of kin. Thus, 
while every family was fully and promptly 
informed of any of its members dead or 
wounded, the information, being scat- 
tered in detail throughout the whole coun- 
try, was of no use to the enemy, for 
nobody could gather all the individual 
reports, of course. 

Q. — Have the nations at war tried 
to hide their total casualties? 

A. — Yes and no. They have tried sys- 
tematically to hide them from their ene- 
mies, of course. Some have also tried in 
various ways not to dismay their own 
people by too sudden or drastic a state- 
ment of aggregate losses, especially after 
heavy engagements. For this purpose they 



have tried many methods and ways of 
presenting the facts in what they deemed 
the most advisable form. In conse- 
quence, even the most careful statistician 
with the best accumulations of official 
statements before him, finds that it is im- 
possible to give accurate and final esti- 
mates of the total losses in this war. 

Q. — Did the British Government 
not report its aggregate losses? 

A. — Yes. It issued weekly and monthly 
lists, and then made it a regular thing 
to issue a weekly list giving in total the 
number of officers and men killed, 
wounded or missing. 

Q. — How did the outer world get 
reports of the German losses? 

A. — The Germans posted printed local 
lists in all the town halls, post-offices, and 
other places where the public could see 
them and look for the names of friends 
or kindred. It was easy enough to ascer- 
tain the lengths of the columns and, by 
counting the names in one, to estimate 
the whole number at a glance. As the 
country was full of neutrals in the early 
part of the war, this information went 
out pretty freely. After some time, how- 
ever, it was discovered that the German 
system of army corps, divisions, etc., 
caused many duplications, the same name 
being given in different lists in different 
parts of the country. However, with 
estimates and the figures given from time 
to time by the Government, a fairly ac- 
curate estimate was reached. 

Q. — Have the French made their 
losses public? 

A. — No. The French have maintained 
consistently that it would give the Ger- 
mans important information, and in 
March, 1918, they represented to General 
Pershing that the American custom of 
making public full details of names, resi- 
dences, etc., of killed and wounded was 
dangerous. General Peyton C. March, act- 
ing Chief of Staff in Washington, in dis- 
cussing the French attitude, repeated that 
the French Government has never issued 
a casualty list of any kind since the be- 
ginning of the war. The French War 
Office in Paris transmits the name of 
every man killed or wounded to the mayor 
of the town from which he came, and this 
official notifies the family. 



121 



122 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Has a fairly close estimate of 
the total killed and wounded 
ever been made? 

A.— In the autumn of 1918 an official 
American computation was made, and the 
figures follow on this page. They are 
given with the caution that they were of- 
fered only as estimates. It was not pos- 
sible to give absolutely accurate figures 
of losses in man power, owing to the 
fact that complete casualty lists were 
not published by all the belligerent coun- 
tries, Great Britain being the only Euro- 
pean power that published such lists regu- 
larly up to the time the calculation was 
made. The figures given here, therefore, 
must be accepted only as the closest esti- 
mates possible at the end of September, 
1918. American casualties are not in- 
cluded, because the American practice of 
publishing exact figures daily informs the 
nation fully and continuously. 

Q. — What were these casualty es- 
timates at the end of Septem- 
ber, 1918? 

A. — They were as follows, for the first 
four years of the war: 

Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy, 
Serbia, and Roumania — total killed, 4,811,- 
641 ; total wounded, 5,740,073 ; total cas- 
ualties, 10,551,714. 

Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey and 
Bulgaria— total killed, 2,970,836; total 
wounded, 6,738,717 ; total casualties, 9,709,- 

553- 

At this time, no exact figures were 
available for the losses of brave Bel- 
gium. An estimate which approximates 
the Belgian losses in the first four years 
of war reasonably well, is that Belgium's 
total casualties in killed and wounded were 
far over 165,000, counting those wounded 
who returned to the front after being 

Entente Powers Dead 

Great Britain 434,774 

France 1,375,069 

Russia 2,762,064 

Italy 63,250 

Serbia 76,484 

Roumania 100,000 

Total 4,811,641 

Central Powers 

Germany 1,812,500 

Austria-Hungary 964,368 

Turkey 182,644 

Bulgaria 11,324 

Total 2,970,836 

Grand Total 7.782,477 



healed. Figures furnished for this book 
at the end of September, 1918, by Major 
Leon Osterrieth, Chief of the Military 
Belgian Mission, were that Belgian losses 
in killed and disabled wounded who 
could not return to the front were be- 
tween 135,000 and 150,000. 

Q. — How many men were killed al- 
together and how many were 
wounded, counting both sides 
together? 

A. — For the nations named in the pre- 
ceding statement, these figures gave a total 
of 7,782,477 men killed in the first four 
years of the war without counting in the 
Belgian killed. The total wounded on all 
sides were figured as 12,478,790, without 
counting in Belgian's wounded. 

Q. — What grand total of casualties 
for both sides did this make, 
adding killed and wounded to- 
gether? 

A. — They would total, with estimates 
of 150,000 Belgian killed and wounded in- 
cluded, 20,411,267 men. Of the wounded, 
as the various estimates on the next page 
show, 79 to 80 per cent recover so well 
that they can return to active service. A 
very big proportion is able to return to 
the actual fighting line, and the rest re- 
turn to duties closely or importantly con- 
nected with active fighting. Therefore 
the huge number of wounded does not 
remotely represent men who will return 
to civilian life disabled. 

Q. — How were the casualties dis- 
tributed among the various na- 
tions? 

A. — The following table is the official 
American computation already mentioned : 



Wounded 

979,154 
1,600,279 
2,466,572 
182,898 
261,170 
250,000 


Total Casualties 

1,413,928 

2,975,384 

5,228,636 

246,148 

337,654 
350,000 


5,740,073 

4,569,820 

1,779,317 

370,452 

19,128 


10,551,714 

6,382,320 

2,743,685 

553,096 

30,452 


6,738,717 


9,709,553 


12,478,790 


20,261,267 



Casualties of War 



123 



Q. — What proportion of wounded 
men die? 

A. — Modern surgery has so progressed 
that only about eight per cent of the 
wounded fail to survive. Of the remain- 
ing 92 per cent, about 20 per cent are 
more or less permanently disabled. The 
rest are able to return to the firing line. 
Thus, about 72 per cent of the wounded 
recover. 

Q. — Is it true that more than ninety 
per cent of the German wound- 
ed recover and return to the 
front? 

A. — The German military authorities 
declare that 89 per cent return to duty. 
The Committee on Public Information, 
in its "Home-Reading Course for Amer- 
ican Citizen Soldiers," says : 

"Even in the early months of the war 
it was announced that of the wounded 
actually treated in French hospitals, 54.5 
per cent were returned to duty within a 
short time ; 24.5 per cent were sent home 
to complete recovery, and later returned 
to duty; 17 per cent at the time of mak- 
ing the report were still in hospitals, with 
the probability of complete recovery; 1.5 
per cent were unfit for further service ; 
2.5 per cent had died from the effects of 
their wounds." 

This would make 79 per cent of the 
wounded returning to duty, and, adding 
the 17 per cent who were listed as prob- 
ably sure to recover, it would make 96 
per cent. 

However, it is extremely unlikely that 
this great percentage can all return to the 
fighting work known as "active duty." 
A big proportion must, no doubt, be as- 
signed to easier work, behind the lines, 
guarding communications, etc. 

Q. — What was the ratio of killed 
in the third year of war? 

A. — Much less than it had been in the 
earlier periods. In March, 1918, a United 
States Government report said : 

"It appears that the killed in action and 
died of wounds have not exceeded one- 
fifth of the total casualties. Approxi- 
mately four-fifths survive. Some among 
these recover completely, developing 100 
per cent of their former vocational ef- 
ficiency ; some recover partial efficiency 
in their old employment ; some are inca- 
pacitated totally for their old employment, 
but are capable of greater or less effi- 
ciency in other employments, provided 



they get the vocational training required 
to overcome their specific handicaps ; some 
are totally incapable for any sort of vo- 
cational training. 

Q. — Has the rate of casualties de- 
creased steadily in this war? 

A. — Yes. In France, for instance, the 
ratio of casualties was highest during the 
opening period of the war, in which the 
battles of Charleroi and the Marne were 
fought. In each six months of the years 
1915 and 1916 the ratio of casualties to 
men mobilized in the French Army de- 
clined : from 2.39 per cent in the first six 
months of 1915 to 1.68 per cent in the 
six months following; to 1.47 per cent in 
the first half of 1916, and to 1.28 per cent 
in the latter half of that year. 

Q. — Is every "disabled" man a 
hopeless cripple? 

A. — An official statement made in 
Washington early in 1917 said : 

"The popular idea that every disabled 
man is a cripple is disproved by the fig- 
ures of the inter-Allied conference, held 
in Paris in May, 1917. These figures show 
only 167 cases of amputation in every 1,000 
disabilities. Consequently, 833 cases in 
every 1,000 are injuries of other kinds. 
The men are classified according to their 
most serious disability, but in 14 or 15 
per cent of all cases there are two or 
three, or even four, injuries. Blindness 
is given as low as less than 1 per cent of 
the disabilities, and French figures give 
the percentage of blindness to be .05 per 
cent of the soldiers engaged in battle." 

Q. — Must we expect many of our 
boys to return disabled? 

A. — Canadian figures, published early 
in 1918, showed that 10 per cent of the 
men sent overseas had been returned phys- 
ically unfit for further military service, 
and that of this 10 per cent 30 per cent 
were in hospitals at the time of the re- 
port. The majority of these patients were 
convalescing, since men are not returned 
to Canada until their physical condition 
permits. 

On the basis of Canadian and of Eu- 
ropean experience, it would appear that 
the United States may fairly anticipate 
that for 1,000,000 men overseas 100,000 
will be returned each year unfit for mili- 
tary service, and that the number of pa- 
tients constantly in the hospitals will be 
from 30,000 to 50,000. 



124 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Just what number of men are 
likely to be disabled? 

A. — A broad general estimate by Amer- 
ican Government experts is as follows : 

Number of men in service 1,000,000 

Number of men returned unfit 

for military service 100,000 

Number not requiring voca- 
tional re-education 80,000 

Number requiring vocational re- 
education : 

Complete 10,000 

Partial 10,000 

Q. — What have the British casual- 
ties been lately? 

A. — British casualties reported in De- 
cember, 1917, reached a total of 79,527, 
divided as follows: Killed or died of 
wounds — officers, 1,045; men, 14,805. 
Wounded or missing — officers, 3,342; 
men, 60,335. Casualties reported from 
December 26 to 31 were 9,951, divided 
as follows: Killed or died of wounds 
— officers, 65; men, 2,059. Wounded 
or missing — officers, 238; men, 7,589. 
The total British casualties for the 
last six months of 1917 were 521,373, 
the lowest figure in any one month be- 
ing 60,373 for August. 

Q. — What is the proportion of 
officers to men killed and 
wounded? 

A. — That is difficult to say, as only 
Great Britain gives any particulars as 
to how many officers are among the 
casualties. It is pretty certain that at 
the beginning of the war the losses 
of English officers were heavier than 
those of the French, Germans or Rus- 
sians. All neutrals appear to agree 
that the British officer exposed him- 
self too much, but that fault had been 
remedied, and they had learned that, 
after all, an officer is the part of the 
machinery of an army most difficult 
to replace. Roughly, there was one 
officer to every forty men in the British 
Army. In the early engagements there 
was one officer to every thirty men in 
the casualty lists, but sometimes the 
proportion was as high as one to fif- 
teen. 

Q. — Did the German officers suffer 
equal casualties? 

A. — While no comparative figures are 
at hand, the general news from the be- 



ginning of the war indicated _ that the 
German officers were not exposing them- 
selves in any degree as were the British. 
During the great offensive that beat the 
German armies back from their advanced 
positions to the old Hindenburg line and 
beyond (in July, August, September, 
1918), the press dispatches carried more 
and more statements that the German 
private soldiers were sent forward while 
their officers remained behind. 



Q. — What casualties have the 
Canadians sustained? 

A. — At the end of 1917, the casualties 
were as follows: 

Killed 40,000 

Wounded 108,000 

Missing 31,955 



Q. — What army hospitals have we? 

A. — In September, 1918, we had ready 
or nearly ready the following: General 
Hospitals — New York: Williamsbridge, 
Fort Porter (Buffalo), Fort Ontario (Os- 
wego), Otisville, Dansville. New Jersey: 
Colonia (Rahway), Lakewood, Cape May. 
Maryland : Fort McHenry, Roland Park. 
Georgia: Fort McPherson (Atlanta), Fort 
Oglethorpe. Hot Springs, Arkansas ; 
Fort Bayard, New Mexico ; San Fran- 
cisco; Takoma Bridge, D.C. ; Biltmore, 
Waynesville, Azalea, N. C. ; Corpus 
Christi, Texas ; New Haven, Conn. ; 
Markleton, Penn. ; Boston ; Whipple Bar- 
racks, Arizona ; Denver ; Richmond, Va. ; 
Fort des Moines, Iowa. Base Hospitals 
— Camp Upton, Plattsburgh, Camp Mills, 
N. Y. ; Camp Beauregard, La. ; Camp 
Bowie, Camp Logan, Camp McArthur, 
Camp Travis, Fort Bliss, Fort Sam Hous- 
ton, Texas ; Camp Cody, N. M. ; Camp 
Custer, Mich. ; Camp Devens, Mass. ; 
Camp Shelby, Miss. ; Camp Dix, N. J. ; 
Camp Dodge, Iowa ; Camp Doniphan, 
Okla. ; Edgewood Arsenal, Camp Meade, 
Md. ; Camp Eustis, Camp Humphreys, 
Camp Lee, Virginia; Camp Fremont, 
Camp Kearney, Cal. ; Camp Gordon, Camp 
Hancock, Camp Wheeler, Ga. ; Camp 
Grant, 111. ; Camp Jackson, Camp Sevier, 
Camp Wadsworth, S. C. ; Camp Greene, 
N. C. ; Camp Johnston, Fla. ; Camp Lewis, 
Wash. ; Camp McClellan, Camp Sheridan, 
Ala.; Camp Pike, Ark.; Camp Sherman, 
Ohio; Camp Taylor, Ky. ; Fort Benjamin 
Harrison, Ind. ; Fort Logan Roote, Ark. ; 
Fort Riley, Kansas. Jersey City, N. J. 
There_ were also six great embarkation 
and disembarkation hospitals in the port 
of New York. 



Casualties of War 



125 



Q. — What causes the most casual- 
ties? 

A. — During trench warfare apparently 
the chief cause of casualties was the ex- 
plosive shell, including shrapnel. Bayonet 
wounds, despite the frequent reference to 
this weapon, were decidedly in the minor- 
ity. During the more open fighting of 
1918 the machine-gun appeared to have 
produced most casualties. 

Q. — What were the British casual- 
ties in the Gallipoli campaign? 

A. — It was officially stated that up to 
December 9, 1915, the total number of 
British casualties at the Dardanelles were 
as follows : 

Killed— 

Officers 1,667 

Others 24,535 

Wounded — ■ 

Officers 3,028 

Others 72,781 

Missing — 

Officers 350 

Others 12,194 

A total altogether of.. 114,555 

_ The Australian casualty lists, as pub- 
lished there up to the end of March, 1916, 
gave the following total : 

Dead— 

Officers 347 

Others 6,443 

Wounded — 

Officers 262 

Others 10,1 18 

Missing — 

Officers 19 

Others 1,887 

A total altogether of.. 19,076 

If we deduct this from the 114,555 
British casualties) we get the losses (95,- 
000), which were sustained by British 
forces, other than Australian, on the Pen- 
insula. It is reasonable to assume that, as 
the British losses were five times as great 
as the Australian, there must have been 
five times as many British and Indian 
troops used on the peninsula as there 
were Australian. In addition, there were 
a large number of French soldiers used at 
Krithia. 



Q. — How much does it cost to kill 
a soldier? 

m A. — The French General Percin has es- 
timated that in the Franco-Prussian War 
of 1870-71, it cost $21,000 each; in the 
Russo-Japanese War of 1905, it cost $20,- 
500. It is impossible to make even a 
rough estimate as to the amount it costs 
to kill a man in the present war. It is 
undoubtedly costing more to kill one now 
than it did in 1914. If we assume that 
during the first three years the total num- 
ber of men killed was 3,000,000, and the 
total amount of cash expended by the 
belligerents on the war was $75,000,000,- 
000, it would work out at $25,000 per man 
killed. 

Q. — Is it true that the Germans use 
moss instead of cotton wool 
for dressing wounds? 

A. — The Germans are not alone in using 
it. Sphagnum moss is used by all the ar- 
mies. Special machinery has been devised 
to prepare the moss for use. It is washed 
first and freed from any foreign sub- 
stance. It then is wrung out and passes 
to the drying room. After being thor- 
oughly dried it is weighed and compressed 
in powerful hydraulic presses. It is being 
widely used now, giving indeed much bet- 
ter results than cotton wool. Its healing 
powers were discovered quite by accident. 
A worker met with a serious injury in a 
peat moss litter works, and, no appliances 
being handy, his fellows laid moss litter 
on the wound and bandaged it up. When 
the man reached a hospital, the doctors 
were horrified at the dirty-looking litter, 
and declared that the limb would have to 
be amputated. They found, however, that 
far from poisoning the wound, as they 
had feared, the injury had been actually 
cleaned by the rude emergency dressing. 
Thus was "discovered" sphagnum moss 
from the surgeon's point of view. 

Q. — Are all soldiers vaccinated 
against typhoid? 

A. — Yes. All the British, French, Ger- 
man and American soldiers are inoculated 
against typhoid on the American plan, 
which proved singularly successful only 
recently when our troops were on the 
Mexican border. The Japanese used the 
system, or one like it, in the Russo-Jap- 
anese War with wonderful results. 

Q. — Are our soldiers vaccinated 
against anything else? 

A. — Yes. They get a series of inocula- 
tions. They are, of course, vaccinated 



126 



Questions and Answers 



against small-pox. In addition, they are 
inoculated against the pneumonia germ, 
against measles and scarlet fever, and spe- 
cialists were working in 1918 to find the 
germ of the dreaded "trench fever." 

Q. — What is tetanus? 

A. — It is the disorder known by the 
common name of lockjaw. It is caused 
by the bacilli tetani, a germ having its 
home in the earth. For this reason the 
grim affliction is so prevalent among 
wounded soldiers, who often lie for hours 
with open wounds, on the fields, or in 
trenches. In acute cases the chance of re- 
covery is exceedingly remote. 

Q. — Is there no cure? 

A. — There is an antitoxin treatment, 
first used on an extensive and radical scale 
during the war. It is not a positive cure, 
but it has greatly minimized the fatali- 
ties. 

Q. — What happens to wounded be- 
tween two lines? 

A. — The wounded remain where they 
fall. It is impossible to remove them. 
Those who can do so endeavor to crawl 
away. Succeeding charges go over them. 
There is no practice in the war of allow- 
ing the enemy to remove them from the 
zone of fire. After the attacks have 
failed, all those who are severely wounded 
may have to remain where they are, and 
the majority die. 

Q. — How does care of wounded 
compare with the Civil War? 

A. — The wounded in the Civil War 
were collected at night by both armies, 
instead of during the conflict, each side 
by mutual agreement allowing the other 
side to carry on the work unmolested. 

Little was done toward speeding up the 
treatment of the wounded, except in a 
few cases that came to the attention of 
the army surgeon, as he rode about the 
battlefield in company with mounted staff 
officers. He would select a few of the 
less serious cases, carry them to a favor- 
able place, and give treatment. Only in 
the latter part of the war were anything 
like dressing-stations or field-hospitals es- 
tablished, and then only when buildings 
near by offered temporary shelter. 

Q. — Does the medical service suf- 
fer heavily in this war? 

A. — During three years of war the 
British Medical Corps suffered 11,667 cas- 
ualties, with a death-roll of 1,200. 



Q. — Are many soldiers incapaci- 
tated without being wounded? 

A. — Yes. Very many. There are big 
groups who suffer from functional dis- 
turbances of the central nervous system. 
These cases present paralyses and other 
disturbances of locomotion, which are 
purely hysterical, or they show mental dis- 
orders which are also functional, but are 
like true insanity. One of the character- 
istic cases is that known as "shell shock," 
due to sudden and unexpected exposure 
to the vibration and noise of the discharge 
of high explosives. Much success has 
been achieved by systems of nerve and 
muscle education, especially in French in- 
stitutions devoted to this work. 

Q. — Has the war produced new 
diseases? 

A. — Yes — new in the sense that Western 
and Central Europe had never been af- 
flicted by them before. One is "spotted 
typhus," carried by the body louse — nor- 
mally found only in Southeastern Europe. 
Another disease is known as "trench 
fever," which is a short, very debilitating 
fever of low mortality, that incapacitates 
its victims for an appreciable period. 

Q. — Has antisepsis been developed 
in this war? 

A. — Very much so. Dr. Samuel W. 
Lambert, dean of the College of Physi- 
cians and Surgeons, says : 

"The greatest additions to the anti- 
septic treatment of wounds have come 
from the studies of Dr. Dakin, who has 
applied the properties of chlorine prepara- 
tions to the disinfection of wounds. The 
problem which he solved was to discover 
strong antiseptics able to destroy microbes 
without damaging normal tissues. Dr. 
Alexis Carrel developed a method of 
using Dr. Dakin's antiseptics by putting 
into the wounded tissues a system of 
multiple tubes, and thus keeping the 
wound constantly washed with the anti- 
septic solution." 

Q. — Can disabled soldiers really be 
made self-supporting? 

A. — Of the men returned in Canada 
unfit for military service, 80 per cent re- 
turn to their former occupations without 
vocational training or are incapable of 
such training, and 20 per cent require vo- 
cational training. One-half of those re- 
quiring vocational training, or 10 per cent 
of those returned unfit for military serv- 
ice, require complete vocational re-educa- 



Casualties of War 



127 



tion, and one-half partial vocational re- 
education. 

Q. — What was the first nation to 
use her wounded over again? 

A. — Belgium, whose depletion has been 
the greatest, was the first nation success- 
fully to use her men over again. Not 
only has the large Belgian re-education 
center of Port Villez been self-support- 
ing, but it has paid back to the Belgian 
Government the entire capital cost of in- 
stallation. The men, meantime, have not 
only received 43 centimes per day, the 
regular pay of the Belgian soldier, but 
also 5 to 20 centimes an hour, according 
to their work. In addition, surplus prof- 
its are funded for the men. Forty-three 
trades are taught at Port Villez under the 
most competent instructors. A large part 
of the material for the Belgian Army is 
made by them. 



Q. — What are we going to do about 
men who are disabled? 

A. — Plans for the rehabilitation and re- 
education of soldiers and sailors disabled 
in the war, so that they may actually earn 
higher wages than before their enlistment, 
have been outlined in two reports sub- 
mitted to Congress by the Federal Board 
of Vocational Education. The reports 
urged an immediate appropriation for the 
training of teachers for the work and for 
establishing great schools near hospitals 
in all parts of the country. 

Q. — Has Germany reclaimed many- 
disabled men? 

A. — The Federal Board of Vocational 
Education says : 

"It is claimed that Germany uses 
85 to 90 per cent of her disabled back of 
the lines, and that the majority of the re- 
maining 10 to 15 per cent are entirely self- 
supporting." 



Q. — What is the difference be- 
tween indemnity and repara- 
tion? 

A. — In many ways the terms are syn- 
onymous. A nation sufficiently victorious 
to lay down terms that its enemy simply 
must accept, would be very likely to make 
only very dubious technical distinction be- 
tween the two. 

Adhering closely to the narrow mean- 
ing of the two words, however, there is a 
decided difference. The payment of in- 
demnity carries with it a confession that 
the nation paying it has wrongfully 
caused a war. No nation acknowledges 
such a thing as a rule. Therefore in- 
demnity in its final essence is a payment 
exacted under duress from a vanquished 
nation. 

Reparation, on the other hand, may con- 
ceivably be a voluntary payment made by 
a victorious nation. Such reparation 
would be chiefly a matter of bookkeep- 
ing, limiting itself to repayment of actual 
material values destroyed. It might pos- 
sibly extend so far as to repay even the 
war-expenses of the nation getting the 
reparation, but that is highly unlikely. 

Q. — Which would involve the most 
money — indemnity or repara- 
tion? 

A. — Indemnity is an arbitrarily fixed 
sum which the vanquished nation is ex- 
pected to pay without argument. A victor 
might exact an indemnity which is actu- 
ally less than his own material money 
losses — that is, it might be less than 
actual reparation would cost. But indem- 
nity generally is a huge sum whose basic 
principle would be that the vanquished 
must pay first of all the war-expenses of 
the victor. To this might be added any- 
thing that the victor may choose, or, at 
least, as much as he might think the van- 
quished can pay. Such indemnity might 
include both material and intangible 
damages — loss of life, of trade, sufferings 
of the nation at home, loss of trade, in- 
jury to national prestige, even injury to 
national dignity. 



BATTLES OF THE GREAT WAR 



Q. — What was the most important 
battle of the war? 

A.— Up to August, 1918, the first great 
battle of the war— the Battle of the 
Marne — still ranked as the most impor- 
tant. It utterly destroyed Germany's 
chance for a swift and complete decision. 
It lasted 4 days and engaged over 2 mil- 
lion men on a 150-mile front. It opened 
on September 5, 1914, when the French 
armies suddenly ceased their retreat and 
a new army from Paris struck hard at 
the German right wing under von Kluck. 
This wing was instantly in imminent peril 
and only marvellously swift intelligence 
work saved it from dire disaster. As it 
was, von Kluck, on September 6, managed 
to bring troops to the threatened point 
and get respite by counter-attacks until he 
could withdraw toward the Aisne. The 
German High Command immediately con- 
centrated vast pressure against the French 
center under General Foch, threatening to 
break through. On September 9 he dis- 
covered a weak spot between Generals von 
Bulow and Hausen. He launched a ter- 
rific drive against the Prussian Guard, 
smashed through, and the battle was won, 
"forcing the whole German line to retreat 
with all speed, the right flank retiring 70 
miles and leaving guns, prisoners and 
flags. The aggregate losses for both 
sides are estimated at 300,000. 

Q. — When did a Russian army 
make a wonderful escape? 

A. — After the fall of Warsaw in 1915, 
General Hindenburg tried to smash be- 
tween two parts of the Russian Army, and 
capture or destroy it in the Pripet 
Marshes. The Russian situation was so 
desperate that for a few days total disas- 
ter seemed inevitable. But by wonder- 
fully brilliant tactics (among the most 
brilliant in the war, during which at one 
time they actually surrounded two Ger- 
man army corps even while they were 
surrounded themselves) they broke their 
way out. 

The retreat, under the circumstances, 
could not fail to be disastrous. The Ger- 
mans made 100,000 prisoners during a 
week; but the Russian Army, as an army, 
was saved. 

Q. — What was the first pitched 
battle of the war? 
A.— The first pitched battle of the war 



was in front of Metz after French forces 
had crossed the German frontier. It was 
fought while German forces still were in 
Belgium, before they had made their way 
into France. The French were defeated. 

Q. — What was the most spectacu- 
lar operation of the war? 

A. — Perhaps it was the sea and land 
attack on the Dardanelles. But the one 
that was clearest and most graphic to the 
American people was no doubt the tre- 
mendous attack on, and the marvellous 
defense of Verdun, the military key to 
the west front, which the German Crown 
Prince tried to take in 1916. It has been, 
since 1871, the most important of the 
French defenses on the eastern frontier 
between the Argonne and the Vosges. 

During the German advance of 1914 
Verdun held out under violent attack, 
although the Germans were^able to push a 
deej) salient to the south at St. ftlihiel. 

In February, 1916, the armies of _ the 
German Crown Prince began a furious 
and sensational assault upon Verdun. At 
first the German offensive proved irre- 
sistible and led to the capture of a large 
portion of the fortified area around Ver- 
dun and of such important forts as 
Douaumont and Vaux. But the German 
losses were terrific. Verdun was called 
"the grave" by German soldiers, and the 
final check administered to their attacks 
by the French marked the end of German 
offensive for a long period on the western 
front. A counter offensive, organized by 
General Nivelle in October, 1916, and an- 
other in August, 1917, enabled the French 
at small cost quickly to reclaim practically 
all "the ground they had lost in the great 
German attack of 1916. 

Q. — Is the Chemin des Dames a 
fort? 

A. — No. It is simply a road, but a most 
important one, because it runs along a 
crest of hills overlooking the valley of 
the Ailette River in northern France. 
Here the Germans retained a foothold 
after the battle" of the Aisne. The French 
offensive north of Rheims in the summer 
of 1917 included attacks on the town of 
Craonne and the Chemin des Dames. 

The French success at the Chemin des 
Dames in June furnished some of the 
most desperate fighting of the war. Ger- 
man counter attacks against the ridge in 
28 



Battles of the Great War 



129 



July outrivaled their attacks at Verdun. 
They failed to dislodge the French from 
their advantage. 

Q. — Why did the Russians not 
break into Germany early in 
the war? 

A. — They did so twice, but the fortune 
of war went badly against them. Almost 
as soon as war began they sent a big army 
into East Prussia, but August 26-31, 1914, 
General Hindenburg fought and won the 
famous Battle of Tannenberg and cap- 
tured practically the entire army. 

In January, 1915, the Russians moved 
through the Mazurian Lake regions (in 
the same general territory and with the 
same general object of over-running East 
Prussia). They advanced so rapidly that 
the world expected the certain investment 
of Koenigsberg and other fortified Ger- 
man cities. But in February Hindenburg 
again countered and the Russians suffered 
a terrific disaster in the lakes and swamps, 
being routed in almost complete disorder 
and losing more than 40,000 men in pris- 
oners beside the big losses in killed. This 
great battle ended all Russian attempts 
to invade Germany. After that the Rus- 
sians centered their efforts on the Aus- 
trian front, so far as attempts at inva- 
sion went. 

Q. — Why was there such a fight 
for the Carso? 

A. — Because the Carso is a huge moun- 
tainous plateau that commands the road 
to Trieste. It is near the head of the 
Adriatic and on the coast road from the 
Isonzo to Trieste. The Italians began a 
mighty offensive in this region late in 
May, 1917. Its initial success promised 
to clear the entire front from Tolmino 
to the sea. A sudden and absolutely catas- 
trophic Austro-German drive began in 
this region in October, 1917, and pressed 
the Italians back to the Piave River after 
a defeat that bade fair at one time to 
shatter the Italian resistance and give all 
Venetia to the invaders. But at the Piave 
the Italians succeeded in holding fast. 

Q. — Was the Gallipoli campaign a 
failure ? 

A. — Yes. The British and French 
forces were withdrawn and the attempt 
to force the Dardanelles abandoned after 
eight months fighting in which 115,000 
British soldiers alone were killed, 
wounded or captured. 



Q. — To what has the Dardanelles 
failure been ascribed? 

A. — In the first place the almost impreg- 
nable nature of the straits made a problem 
such as rarely has confronted an attacking 
force. Wonderful heroism was displayed 
throughout and the world was thrilled by 
the deeds of the soldiers in the British 
Gallipoli expedition, but the defense had 
an immense advantage. Strategically and 
tactically the military reasons given for 
non-success have been : lack of sufficient 
immediate concentration of land forces on 
the Gallipoli peninsula, due to the necessi- 
ty for also guarding Egypt; lack of suf- 
ficiently close cooperation between army 
and navy; lack of sufficient heavy artil- 
lery. The first attempt, which was made 
by the navy alone, was a total non-success 
and for a long time military experts held 
that it only demonstrated anew that pow- 
erful coast-fortifications cannot be re- 
duced from the sea without simultaneous 
land-actions to assail them in the rear. 
In 1918, however, Henry Morgenthau, who 
was in Constantinople at the time as Am- 
erican Ambassador, made the sensational 
disclosure that both German and Turkish 
authorities had despaired of holding the 
city should the bombardment continue. 

Q. — Has this front been quite 
abandoned? 

A. — Gallipoli was completely evacuated 
January 8, 1916. 

Q. — Has there been any really de- 
cisive battle so far? 

A. — No — not decisive in the sense of 
winning the war. A number of battles 
have been decisive as changing the phases 
of the war. Thus the Battle of the Marne 
in September, 1914, definitely ended the 
triumphant sweep of the Germans toward 
Paris, and made impossible their plans 
for cutting off the French Army, and thus 
ending the war in the west quickly, be- 
fore Russia could get ready in the East. 

Again the two battles (Tannenberg and 
the Mazurian Lakes) destroyed the Rus- 
sian plans for invading Germany. 

The first battle of Verdun, February to 
October, 1916, decided the character of 
Germany's warfare for a long time there- 
after, forcing the Germans to a defensive 
holding of their line in place of an of- 
fensive. 

The battles of October and November, 
1917, on the Isonzo and related Italian 
fronts swept away the Italian gains of 
two years and decisively carried the war 
into the Italian plains. 



130 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — How did the great German 
offensive of 1918 open? 

A. — It began March 21, 1918. About 
ninety-five German divisions of 12,000 men 
each were thrown swiftly against the 
British line on a fifty-mile front from 
Arras to La Fere. By April 12th they 
were being held on the north by the Brit- 
ish, but on the south they had arrived 
within 4^2 miles of the great railroad 
from Paris to Calais via Amiens. 

On April 9, 191 8, they opened a second 
attack in Flanders north of Lens and 
gained 10 miles on a 30-mile front. On 
May 27 they began a rush through the 
Champagne front and drove forward to 
the .salient .Chateau Thierry, establishing 
the line Soissons-Chateau Thierry and 
reaching .the Marne. They were curiously 
inactive then until July 15, when they 
launched a new offensive south of Rheims 
and crossed the Marne. 

Q. — Was it this attack that started 
the great counter-offensive? 

A. — Yes. General Foch, supported by 
some 300,000 American troops, launched 
a mighty counter-offensive that began on 
the western side of the salient and stead- 
ily widened in scope and intensified in 
degree. Between July 15 and 30 this at- 
tack cut the German line Soisson-Chateau 
Thierry and forced the German lines back 
across the Ourcq to the Aisne. 

Q. — Had American troops gained 
vantage points before this? 

A. — Yes. On May 28, 1918, they had 
captured Cantigny, a town at the extreme 
western point of the German thrust at 
Amiens and had thus established a firm 
defense against further penetration there. 
Soon after the counter-offensive on the 
Soissons front began, American troops 
took Chateau Thierry. They entered it 
on July 18, i9i8, less than a month after 
the Germans had taken it. 

Q. — Was this the beginning of the 
great German retreat? 

A. — Yes. The mighty French, British 
and American attack at once began to de- 
velop the quality of continuing without 
pause — something new in this war which 
to that time had seen only short-lived at- 
tacks, even when they were on a large 
scale. Day after day the German armies 
were driven steadily and quickly back- 
ward, giving up huge areas of hard-won 
ground. Without pause they were struck 
along the whole wide front — now by the 
British in the north, now by the Ameri- 
cans, now by the French. 



Q.— What part 
troops play? 



did American 

A. — They played a very effective part — 
so effective as to earn praise from veteran 
French commanders, which was undoubt- 
edly earnest and not simply complimen- 
tary. There was apparently no striking 
difference between them and the seasoned 
troops of Europe. They met furious re- 
sistance from German veterans and car- 
ried off the victory. Finally, they proved 
their ability when they struck the famous 
blow that wrested the equally famous St. 
Mihiel salient from the Germans. 

Q. — What was the St. Mihiel sal- 
ient? 

A. — It was a position south-east of 
Verdun, held by the Germans in such a 
manner that it thrust a huge German 
wedge into that part of the French army 
zone, making the supply of the Verdun 
region very difficult and maintaining a 
constant and serious menace. The Ger- 
mans had established this salient in Sep- 
tember, 1914, and had held it exactly 4 
years when the Americans took it. 

Q. — When did the American at- 
tack begin? 

A. — It began (and ended) September 12 
and 13, 1918. It ended because in one 
swift, colossal blow the American army 
had cut the salient, captured the German 
troops in it, and forced the German army 
to abandon the entire area in wild haste. 
The American troops broke, all records in 
the pace set and distance covered. Ar- 
tillery preparation had begun at midnight 
on September 12. At 5 A. M. September 
13 our troops went in. Less than 24 hours 
later the attacking waves from the two 
sides of the salient met at Vigneulles, 
and the salient was abolished. 

Q. — How many prisoners did we 
take? 

A. — About 25,000 German prisoners 
were "bagged" in the salient. It was es- 
timated that the German losses must have 
exceeded 40,000 men, putting 7 divisions 
out of effective action. So rapid was the 
German retreat that almost all of the 30 
German villages recaptured were intact. 
More prisoners had been taken than in 
any twenty-four hours of the war on the 
French front, and a larger area of French 
territory recaptured than in any similar 
period since 1914. 



SEA FIGHTS OF THE GREAT WAR 



Q. — What was the first naval bat- 
tle of the war? 

A— The Battle of the Bight of Heli- 
goland, August 28, 1914, between Sir 
David Beatty's cruiser squadron and a 
fleet of German cruisers. The Germans 
lost three cruisers, the Mains, Koln, and 
Ariadne, and the British one destroyer. 
Seven hundred Germans perished and 300 
were taken prisoner. 

Q. — When and what was the sea 
battle of Jutland? 

A. — May 31-June I, 1916. It was the 
greatest naval battle in history, in point 
of size of ships and tonnage of warships 
lost. Germany's High Sea fleet, which 
had been for twenty months idle in the 
Kiel Canal, dashed out a hundred miles 
or so from the Jutland coast into the 
North Sea, under command of Admirals 
von Sheer and von Hipper, hoping to en- 
gage and destroy a portion of the British 
fleet before the remainder came to its aid. 

The British battle-cruiser fleet, under 
Sir David Beatty, whose business it was 
to make periodical sweeps through the 
North Sea for the enemy, gave chase, in 
the hope of getting between and cutting 
off the German fleet from its base, while 
wirelessing for the British battle fleet, 
the "Grand Fleet," under Sir John Jel- 
lico, which proceeded at full speed to 
join Sir David Beatty. While the Ger- 
mans do not admit as heavy losses in 
tonnage as the British admit, the German 
fleet was glad to scuttle back to its har- 
bors and Great Britain's rule of the seas 
was not for one moment threatened. 

Q. — What ships were lost in the 
great Jutland battle? 

A.— The Germans admit only the fol- 
lowing losses : 

Ships. Tons. 

Lutzow (battle-cruiser) 28,000 

Pommern (pre-dreadnaught) 13,000 

Rostock (light cruiser) 4,820 

Frauenlob (light cruiser) 2,667 

Weisbaden (light cruiser) 4,300 

Elbing (light cruiser) 4,300 

Five torpedo-boats 

Total German losses in heavy 
tonnage 57.087 

131 



The British admit the following losses: 

Ships. Tons. 

Queen Mary (battle-cruiser) 27,000 

Indefatigable (battle-cruiser) 18,750 

Invincible (battle-cruiser) 17,250 

Defence (armored cruiser) 14,600 

Black Prince (armored cruiser) . . 13,550 

Warrior (armored cruiser) 13,550 

Eight destroyers 

Total British losses in heavy 
tonnage 104,700 

This battle was fought May 31-June 1, 
1916. Each side for a time declared that 
the other side had suffered more losses 
than it would admit, but the United States 
Naval Institute Proceedings for January, 
1918, give the ships listed here, and this 
list agrees with lists given out some time 
ago. 

Q.— Was the "Von Moltke" battle 
cruiser sunk by a British sub- 
marine? 

A.— -It was reported that she was sunk 
by British under-water craft, but the Ger- 
mans denied her loss. In the official Ger- 
man reports about the Jutland battle men- 
tion is made of this battle-cruiser as hav- 
ing taken part. When the Lutzow was 
knocked out, Admiral von Hipper trans- 
ferred his flag from her to the von 
Moltke, according to report. 

Q. — What German ships fought at 
the Falklands? 

A. — The German squadron, under Ad- 
miral von Spee, consisted of the two ar- 
mored cruisers Gneisenau and Scharn- 
horst, both of 11,420 tons, armed with 
eight 8.2-inch guns ; the Leipzig, N 'urn- 
berg and Dresden, of 3,200, 3,350 and 3,544 
tons respectively, armed with 4.1-inch 
guns. There was also a supply ship. The 
Dresden, a sister ship to the Emden, was 
engined with turbines, and, like all turbine 
boats, was able to develop a higher speed 
than that on her recorded trials. Her 
speed enabled her to escape, but she was 
sunk later when at anchor in Chilean wa- 
ters. The supply boat also got away, but 
all the other vessels were sunk, their 
reciprocating engines only giving the 
quickest of them a speed of 2Z knots. 



132 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What was the British 
strength? 

A. — Admiral Sturdee's fleet consisted of 
the dreadnaught-cruisers Inflexible and 
Invincible, both of 17,250 tons, armed with 
eight 12-inch guns, and with a speed of 
25 knots; the battleship Canopus, 12,950 
tons, four 12-inch guns, 18.5 knots ; the 
swift cruisers Glasgow and Bristol, each 
4,800 tons, two 6-inch guns ; the armored 
cruiser Carnarvon, seven 5-inch guns, 23 
knots ; and the Kent and the Cornwall, 
9,800 tons, fourteen 6-inch guns, 23 knots. 

Q. — What bounty was earned by 
Admiral Sturdee and his 
crews? 

A. — They received the ordinary bounty 
of £$ ($25) per head, for each enemy 
sailor on the destroyed boats. In the 
Prize Court, held on August 21 and pre- 
sided over by Sir Samuel Evans, it was 
proved that the crews of the destroyed 
enemy ships were as follows : — Scharn- 
horst, 872 ; Gncisenau, 835 ; Niirnberg 
384 ; and Liepzig, 341 ; a total of 2,432. At 
£5 a head this made the bounty £12,160 
($60,800), which was accordingly awarded 
to Admiral Sturdee and the officers and 
and crews, of the Invincible, Inflexible 
Carnavon, Cornwall, Kent and Glasgow. 
The crew of the Invincible will never enjoy 
their share of this money, as that battle- 
cruiser was sunk in the Horn Reef en- 
gagement. The other two vessels of Stur- 
dee's fleet, the Bristol and Canopus, took 
no part in the action. 

Q. — Did any members of Admiral 
von Spee's squadron get back 
to Germany? 

A. — According to German papers Lieu- 
tenant Otto Schenk, one of the few sur- 
vivors, did succeed in reaching Germany, 
after a journey of eight months. 

Q. — How is a ship cleared for ac- 
tion? 

A. — As soon as the commanding officer 
gives the order "Clear Ship for Action !" 
the various organizations aboard the ves- 
sel perform the duties in which they have 
long been drilled for that vital moment. 
All wooden fittings and articles are re- 
moved and either stored out of harm's 
way or thrown overboard. This is both 
to prevent fire and to obviate the risk of 
killing or maiming men by splinters. All 



metal gear on decks that is not an essential 
part of the structure is also removed. 
All instruments, etc., are taken to safe 
places below the armor belt of the ship. 
Full head of steam is maintained in all 
boilers. Galley fires are extinguished 
Every unnecessary inflammable is thrown 
overboard. Every station is manned. 



Q.— What was the "Emden"? 

A. — She was a small protected cruiser, 
3,500 tons, 24.5 knots, twelve 4-inch guns. 
She and her sister, the Dresden, were the 
first light cruisers the Germans fitted with 
turbine engines, and she made an aston- 
ishing war-cruise in the Pacific and In- 
dian Ocean soon after the war began. 



Q. — How many ships did the "Em- 
den" sink? 

A. — She sank altogether seventeen Brit- 
ish steamers, and captured several others, 
but released them as they contained car- 
goes belonging to neutrals. The values 
in the following list include ship and 
cargo, and are estimated. The total ton- 
nage lost was 74,881, and the value was 
$11,055,000. 

Ship. Tonnage. Value. 

Indus 3,393 690,000 

Lovat 6,102 300,000 

Killin 3,544 215,000 

Diplomat 7.615 1,500,000 

Trabboch 4,015 130,000 

Clan Matheson 4,775 100,000 

Tymeric 3,3*4 905,000 

King Lud 3,650 200,000 

Ribera 3,5oo 180,000 

Foyle 4J47 150,000 

Buresk 4,350 260,000 

Chilkana 5J4Q 1,060,000 

Troilus 7,562 3,400,000 

Benmohr 4,8o6 815,000 

Clan Grant 3,948 640,000 

Ponrabbel 478 145,000 

Exford 4,542 275,000 

Q. — Did the captain of the "Em- 
den" respect the rules of war? 

A. — Apparently he was a bright excep- 
tion to the rule. He disguised his ship by 
putting up an extra funnel, etc., permis- 
sible acts in war. The London Times, 
commenting on the sinking of the ship 
by the Sidney, said that "no deed or bru- 
tality or outrage has been recorded against 
her, and her commander, Captain von 
Muller, is reported to have treated the 



Sea Fights of the Great War 



133 



crews of the vessels which he captured 
with generosity and courtesy." It also re- 
ferred to the difficulty of the operations 
undertaken by the Emden, and said that 
"she carried out her part with a daring 
which friend and foe had equally recog- 
nized." 

Q.— Did the "Emden" raid Pen- 
ang Harbor under the Japanese 
flag? 

A. — A British captain, whose ship was 
in the harbor at the time, said definitely 
that she was flying no flag at all when she 
came in, but flew the German ensign when 
firing on the Russian cruiser. Captain 
von Miiller himself and his crew assert 
that they never flew any flag but their own 
in any of the time, if they showed one at 
all. The only disguise they adopted was 
to add another funnel. Penang Harbor 
was entered at night, and the Russians 
were almost all ashore. 

Q. — Did the Allied ships in Penang 
expect attack? 

A. — Evidently not. They were relying 
on the vigilance of two French destroyers, 
which were patrolling the two entrances to 
the harbor. The Emden never met the 
first one, although a pilot boat approached 
her and fled as soon as it got near enough 
to see who she was. The first torpedo 
fired by the Germans. did not finish the 
Zemtchug, and the Emden turned and 
dispatched another, which proved fatal. 
The German officers were near enough to 
see the Russians hastening up from be- 
low in confusion. The cruiser left by the 
other entrance, and there met and sank 
the French destroyer Mousquet. 

Q.— When was the "Emden" finally- 
caught? 

A. — She was caught by the Australian 
cruiser Sydney at the Cocos Islands in 
the Indian Ocean and destroyed after a 
short engagement on November 10, 1914, 
three months after she had begun her 
adventurous cruise. With exception of 
the few men under von Mucke who man- 
aged to escape, her captain and those of 
her crew who survived were taken pris- 
oners. 

Q.— How could the "Emden" hold 
out so long? 

A. — She simply went out into the Indian 
Ocean, and carefully steamed away when- 
ever she saw foes on the horizon. She 
had plenty of coal from ships she cap- 



tured, and during the whole of her pere- 
grinations she seldom steamed faster than 
twelve knots. She had an exceptionally 
large crew, having on board the men from 
a couple of gunboats left at Kiauchau. 
Thus prize crews could be sent off when- 
ever necessary. 

Q._What became of the "Em- 
den's" men who disappeared 
from Cocos Islands? 

A. — They got away in a sailing boat, 
and finally reached the coast of Arabia, 
some 3,500 miles distant from the scene 
of the disaster which overwhelmed the 
German raider. From Arabia they went 
overland to Constantinople. The story 
of this long wandering through a world 
of foes is like a modern Odyssey and it 
has made everybody familiar with the 
name of von Mucke, the young naval 
officer who led the little band. 

Q. — Which was the greatest naval 
disaster of the war? 

A. — The most serious naval disaster 
reported up to August, 1918, was the sink- 
ing of the French cruiser Provence, which 
was torpedoed on February 26, 1917. It 
had on board nearly 4,000 men, and of 
these 3,130 were drowned. The Provence 
was a converted liner used as a transport, 
and carried eleven guns. No submarine 
was seen. There never has been such loss 
of life when a single ship went down be- 
fore. When the Lusitania was torpedoed 
1,198 lives were lost; when the Titanic 
sank 1,595 people were drowned. 

Q. — Was there a great sea fight in 
the North Sea, in August, 
1914? 

A. — No. This fight was officially re- 
ported in India, but was subsequently con- 
tradicted. The rumor once started, how- 
ever, has gone on, and constant reference 
is made to the alleged action in the neu- 
tral press. A circumstantial report was 
made in 1916 about an engagement off the 
Norwegian coast, but this, too, had no 
foundation in fact. 

Q. — Why were the German cruisers 
"Goeben" and "Breslau" so 
much talked of? 

A. — Because of their extraordinary 
escape from the British and French ships 
in the Mediterranean. They had been 
apparently trapped, but they succeeded in 
evading the cordon at the Straits of 
Otranto. 



*34 



Questions and Answers 



Apparently surrounded, unable to seek 
any port without being blockaded or in- 
terned, the captains of the two ships suc- 
ceeded in escaping from the Adriatic into 
the Mediterranean, made feints at attack- 
ing territory on the African coast, "jam- 
med" the wireless of the British and 
French ships, and succeeded in running 
the cordon and entering the Dardenelles. 

After that they played a part in big 
international history because their pres- 
ence apparently had much to do with de- 
ciding Turkey's action in joining the war. 

Q. — Was Turkey an ally of the 
Central Powers? 

A. — No. Turkey was not then in the 
war, and occupied the position of a neu- 
tral nation. 

Q. — What right did Turkey have 
to give them asylum? 

A. — None. Under international law 
Turkey's duty was to order them out of 
her ports after a reasonable time for re- 
pairs, or else to intern them. 

Q _ Why did Turkey not do this? 

A. — It was very clear to the whole 
world, and of course, to Turkey, that 
sooner or later she would be forced out 
of her neutrality. Apart from many other 
reasons that could be conjectured in ad- 
vance, there was sure to be the demand 
by Russia and Great Britain for passage 
of warships through the Dardanelles. 
Whether she refused or acceded, she was 
certain to be forced into the war. In 
this crisis, the accession to her naval force 
of two such excellent ships was something 
that had a great deal of weight, and may 
have hastened her decision. 

Q. — Did Turkey's protection of the 
ships furnish the actual casus 
belli? 

A. — No. Turkey responded to Great 
Britain's protest by promising to intern 
the ships and put them out of commis- 
sion. After a while, she announced sud- 
denly that she had bought them and in- 
corporated them in the Turkish Navy. 

Q. — Was this legitimate under in- 
ternational law? 

A.— It was a point that opened intricate 
question. The Allied governments, and 



everybody else, knew very well that the 
sale was only a pretended one. But there 
was a big difference between knowing it 
and proving it. Therefore, a Declaration 
of War against Turkey based merely on 
this episode was not considered advisable. 

Q. — Did the Turks retain the 
names of the cruisers? 

A. — They went through all the correct 
forms, apparently, of placing them into 
the Turkish service. The Breslan was re- 
named Midullu and the Goeben was re- 
named Sultan Yawus Selim. 

Q. — Did the two ships play much 
part in fighting? 

A. — In some measure they may be said 
to have brought on the entrance of Tur- 
key into the war by their activities in the 
Black Sea. According to Russia, they 
opened - fire on Russian ships. According 
to Turkey, they were fired on. At any 
rate, on November 3, 1914, Russia de- 
clared war on Turkey. This was followed 
on November 5 by French and British 
declarations of war. 

Q. — Were they of use during the 
attack on the Dardanells? 

A. — Very little, except strategically. 
They did not play much part in the de- 
fense, so far as gunfire or actual opera- 
tions went. But they were of great use 
in helping to guard Turkey's back-door — 
the Black Sea. 

Q. — Were they of any service after 
the Dardanelles campaign? 

A. — They harried the Russian trans- 
port service and also kept the Russian 
coast in more or less unrest, their last 
fairly important service being the sinking 
of many small Russian war-craft and 
merchant ships and the bombardment of 
of Russian coast in June, 1917. After that 
they were not heard from much, until 
January 20, 1918, when there was a sud- 
den action outside of the Dardanelles, 
which ended in the sinking of the Midullu 
(Breslau) and of two British monitors, 
while the Sultan Yawus Selim (Goeben) 
stranded, but finally got back into the 
Dardanelles, badly crippled without 
doubt. The commander of one of the 
British monitors was Viscount Broome, 
nephew of Earl Kitchener. He was 
drowned. 



Sea Fights of the Great War 



135 



Q. — Has seapower proved its value 
in this war? 

A. — Yes. Despite German military suc- 
cesses on land, the loss of the sea was a vi- 
tal loss to the Central Powers from the 
very beginning. It made a wound that never 
ceased bleeding. It could not be healed. 
Inexorably it drained away their internal 
resources by forcing them to exploit them 
without replacement from without. No 
money, no supplies could reach them. It 
destroyed all the Central Powers' com- 
merce, except for such comparatively in- 
significant dealings as they could conduct 
with small neighboring neutrals. The en- 
tire war, complex though it is, again jus- 
tified Admiral Mahan's dictum, and quite 
as sharply as in previous, more simple, 
wars. Sea power meant an incessantly ap- 
plied force that won victories even while 
it was inactive, and that remained un- 
shaken by any campaign fought out on 
land. 



Q. — Had Admiral Mahan's works 
much influence on the thought 
of maritime nations? 

A. — A great deal — not because he dis- 
covered a new priciple but because he 
showed in a wonderfully clear and 
thought-inspiring way just what "sea- 
power" really meant and always has 
meant. His first great work was "The 
Influence of Sea Power Upon History." 
It was produced in 1890, while he was a 
captain, acting as instructor in the Naval 
College at Annapolis. 



Q. — What was the gist of Mahan's 
teachings? 

A. — He showed that the importance 
of sea power lay not merely in its belli- 
gerent might, but in its control over all 
the commerce and other similar funda- 
mental sources of wealth and strength of 
nations. He proved his thesis by exam- 
ples ranging from the Punic wars to mod- 
ern times. The first book was succeeded 
by "The Influence of Sea Power Upon 
the French Revolution and Empire," 
"The Influence of Sea Power Upon the 
War of 1812," "The Embodiment of Brit- 
ish Sea Power" and various other books. 
Their effect on maritime governments- 
was decided. An intelligent conception 
of the true value and functions, of navies 
was their result. 



Q. — Where did sea-power first con- 
trol the world? 

A. — In the Mediterranean after the 
Phoenicians rose to the rank of a great 
nation. As soon as they took to the sea, 
they won almost the control of the world 
so far as it was known then. They 
reached ultimately as far as Spain with 
their colonies. From that time sea power 
remained vital. 

Q. — Did the Germans retain con- 
trol of the sea in the begin- 
ning? 

A. — No. The German fleet remained in 
its fortified bases and made no real at- 
tempt to dispute sea control with its big 
ships. There were sporadic engagements 
almost at once, but there was no attempt 
by the German grand fleet to open a de- 
cisive engagement. It was a drastic illus- 
tration of the meaning of sea power. 

Q. — How about the German raid- 
ers? 

A. — They could do harm, amounting 
to more or less, for a shorter or longer 
time ; but they could not possibly affect 
the control of the sea. Superior sea 
power locked them out from their home 
ports, shut other ports to them and re- 
duced them to cruises of mere adventure, 
romantic but doomed to an absolute end 
sooner or later. 

Q. — What do naval men mean by- 
stripping ship? 

A. — They mean the operation of re- 
moving everything not absolutely needed 
for war. Ships are "stripped" when war 
impends. All useless wooden work is torn 
from cabins, etc. Among the articles sent 
ashore are all trunks, wooden chests, book 
cases, saluting guns, officers' dress uni- 
forms, presentation plate, unnecessary 
rugs, curtains, etc. 

Q. — What is the call to General 
Quarters? 

A. — It calls the entire crew to battle 
stations, turrets, fire control stations, rap- 
id fire guns, torpedo rooms, etc. Every 
gun in the ship is manned and is ready 
to fire. Fire hose are coupled, torpedoes 
loaded, men stand by all valves, etc., and 
all gear is made ready for any emergency. 
General quarters drill is held at least 
once a day in peace on every warship. 



STRATEGY OF THE WAR 

Military and Political 



Q. — What was the first act of bel- 
ligerency that affected outside 
nations directly? 

A. — The immediate severance of all 
methods of communication with Germany. 
By cutting cables the Allies at once pre- 
vented the Central Powers from reaching 
any of their agents throughout the world 
except by wireless or slow secret ways of 
communication. 

Q. — Was this legitimate under In- 
ternational Law? 

A. — 'Cutting cables is an acknowledged 
and consistently practised right of every 
belligerent who has the power to do it. 
Indeed, it is considered one of the for- 
midable instrumentalities for crippling an 
adversary. 

Q. — What were the specific advan- 
tages of cutting communica- 
tions? 

A. — The German naval vessels scattered 
throughout the world were instantly ham- 
pered because the German Admiralty 
could not communicate with them, or, at 
least, could do so only laboriously. The 
German Government was cut off from 
its African colonies, where its soldiers 
thereafter had to fight on their own ini- 
tiative without any assistance. The en- 
tire American continent became sealed to 
them, in a large sense, since the wireless 
was decidedly limited in capacity and the 
transmission of' information by mail or 
messenger was practically out of the ques- 
tion. 

Q. — What could the belligerents 
gain in neutral countries by 
making sentiment? 

A. — They could hope to bring some 
neutral countries into the war on their 
side. They could hope to prevent some 
neutral countries from abandoning a use- 
ful neutrafity. Even in countries which 
they could not hope to win as fellow- 
belligerents, or which they did not need 
to fear as possible allies of their enemies, 
they could hope to mafte such sentiment 
that the neutrality would be distinctly in 
their favor. 



Q. — Did either side wish at first 
to bring the United States in- 
to the war? 

A. — No. Germany could not hope to, if 
she wished. The Allies felt at first that 
they could gain far more, as they frankly 
said, by American productiveness in food 
and munitions than by belligerent as- 
sistance. 

Q. — What was the effort of rival 
activity in Italy? 

A. — Both Austria-Hungary and Ger- 
many recognized early that they need not 
hope for Italy as an ally. Thereafter they 
worked for the sole purpose of keeping 
her neutral. The Allies, on the other 
hand, worked to gain Italy's active mili- 
itary aid. The immediate value of this 
was that she could attack Austria-Hun- 
gary in the west while Russia attacked her 
in the east. 

Q. — Why was Turkey considered 
so important? 

A. — Mostly because she held the Dar- 
danelles. These narrow straits, heavily 
fortified, were not only vital to a military 
Junction between Russia's forces and the 
•other Allies, but they were the door to a 
•tremendous attack on the eastern front of 
•the Central Powers. So long as that door 
was kept closed, Russia had to fight alone 
on the eastern front. Furthermore, she 
could neither ship her grain nor procure 
supplies from outside. The grain was not 
only badly needed, but would have pro- 
vided credits in the outer world for Rus- 
sia. Thus the possession of the Dar- 
danelles was vastly important econom- 
ically as well as from the military view- 
point. As to the latter, there is no doubt 
that the opening of the Dardanelles would 
have meant the definite invasion of Aus- 
tria-Hungary. 

Q. — Would not Turkish neutral- 
ity have served the Germans 
by keeping the Dardanelles 
closed? 

A. — It would. But continued neutrality 
would probably have been impossible for 



136 



Strategy of the War — Military and Political 



137 



the Turks. Sooner or later they would 
have been forced into the war. There- 
fore the German policy was to get her 
aid as an ally without taking a chance. 

Q. — Were the Dardanelles the 
great early strategic prize? 

A. — There were two waterways whose 
absolute and undisturbed control was ab- 
solutely vital for immediate war-purposes. 
They were the British Channel and the 
Dardanelles. 

Q. — Could the Germans hope to 
contest control of the channel 
against the British fleet? 

A. — They could. They could not hope 
to contest it with their battleships, but 
they could hope to do so by capturing 
the entire Belgian coast and the French 
coast at least as far as Calais. Had they 
succeeded, they might have made trans- 
portation of troops and supplies to France 
from England exceedingly difficult by 
using heavy artillery from coast fortifica- 
tions, by greatly expanding their subma- 
rine bases and having them close to the 
British transport lines, and by making 
serious threats by land against Havre, the 
port at the mouth of the Seine. 

Q. — What were the other import- 
ant points in the beginning? 

A. — The control of the North Sea and 
the Baltic Sea, the Kiel Canal, and the 
Austrian naval bases of Trieste and Pola 
on the Adriatic. 

Q. — Did either belligerent gain a 
decisive advantage in these? 

A. — The British gained an almost de- 
cisive preponderance of control in the 
North Sea. The Germans succeeded in 
holding the Baltic almost at their will. 
The Kiel Canal and the Austrian naval 
bases proved practically invulnerable. 

Q. — Just what was the value to 
Germany of the Kiel Canal ? 

A.— It meant that while the British 
might control the North Sea, they could 
not completely rob the German Navy of 
freedom of movement. The best way 
to understand its value is to understand 
that the German North Sea coast and 
the German Baltic coast are separated 
from each other by a mighty tongue of 
land that projects northward until it al- 
most touches Sweden. This is the pro- 
jection on which Denmark is. Thus the 



natural geography made it very difficult 
for naval ships to pass between the Baltic 
and the North Sea. Enemy ships might 
easily have cut them off in the narrow 
passage between Denmark and Sweden 
(the Cattegat) or between Denmark and 
Norway (the Skager Rack). Or, part of 
the German fleet might be blockaded in 
a North Sea port (the mouth of the 
Weser or the Elbe) and another part 
might be blocked within the Baltic, and 
thus the two fleets rendered permanently 
too weak for action. 

Q.— How did the Kiel Canal solve 
this problem? 

A. — The Kiel Canal cuts straight across 
the base of the great projection of land. 
In effect, it has straightened out the coast 
line for naval purposes, and made one 
coast of the North Sea and the Baltic 
coasts. 

Q. — What makes the Kiel Canal 
apparently invulnerable? 

A. — Immense fortifications on land, 
commanding all approaches. Difficult 
coast lines, forcing exceedingly cautious, 
and therefore slow, maneuvering by 
enemy ships. Also the outlying island of 
Heligoland, which is actually one enor- 
mous fortification, armed with every of- 
fensive and defensive device of modern 
warfare, and lying broad in the way of 
ships that seek to approach the North 
Sea mouth of the Kiel Canal. 

Q, — When did Germany acquire 
Heligoland? 

A. — In 1890, under the Caprivi agree- 
ment, Lord Salisbury traded Heligoland 
to Germany in return for Zanzibar. 
There was, of course, at that time no 
thought of Germany's sea rivalry, and the 
island of Heligoland seemed of little im- 
portance to England. It was a mistake, 
however, as the Germans built up the 
hollow coast, turning the island into a 
strong naval fort and making it a front 
and screen for the German fleet, from 
behind which they can assemble and 
make surprise attacks in the North Sea. 

Q. — Did Heligoland prove impreg- 
nable ? 

A. — It had been apparently impregnable 
up to August, 1918, when there had been 
more than 1,400 days of war. Naval men, 
however, knew so well that Heligoland's 
fall would prove decisive that every mind 
was centered on devising a method for 
attack. 



138 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Why cannot a landing be ef- 
fected in Germany between 
Holland and Denmark? 

A. — Heligoland defends the Bight. The 
sea is shallow there, and the channels are 
difficult. The Frisian Islands are strongly- 
fortified, and all approaches are protected 
with the latest appliances for harbor pro- 
tection, sunken torpedoes and other de- 
fenses. For transports to enter that re- 
gion would be to invite destruction. 

Q. — What were the political war 
aims in 1914? 

A. — Allied efforts to bring Turkey, the 
Balkan States and Italy into the war. 
Unsuccessful. German attempts to gain 
Turkey as an ally. Successful. 

Q. — What were the great military 
events of 1914? 

A. — The Battle of the Marne which 
stopped the German advance on Paris. 
The Battle of East Prussia which de- 
feated Russian invasion of Germany. 

Q. — What were the great military 
objectives in 1915? 

A. — In the West, German attempt to 
establish a general defensive. Success- 
ful. 

In the East, Russian attempt to invade 
Hungary. Unsuccessful. German at- 
tempt to occupy Russian Poland. Suc- 
cessful. Austro-German and Bulgarian 
attempt to conquer Serbia. Successful. 
French and British attempt to take Dar- 
danelles. Unsuccessful. 

Q. — What were the political aims 
in 1915? 

A. — German attempt to bring Bulgaria 
in as an ally. Successful. Allied at- 
tempts to bring Roumania and Greece in 
on their side. Unsuccessful. Allied 
effort to win Italy. Successful. 

Q. — What were the vital military 
objectives in 1916? 

A. — In the West, German attempts to 
resume the offensive (Verdun). Un- 
successful. 

In the East, Russian attempt to over- 
run Bukowina. Successful. German and 
Austrian attempt to conquer Roumania. 



Successful. British attempt to capture 
Bagdad. Unsuccessful. 

In the South, Austrian attempt to in- 
vade Italy through Trentino. Partly suc- 
cessful. Italian attempt to break Isonzo 
line. Partly successful. 

Q. — What were the political aims 
of 1916? 

A. — Allied attemot to win Roumania to 
their side. Successful. German attempt 
to induce enemies to meet in peace con- 
ference. Unsuccessful. 

Q. — What were the big military od- 
jectives in 191 7? 

A. — In the West, the French and Brit- 
ish attempt to force a decisive retirement 
of Germans. Unsuccessful. 

In the East, German drive along Rus- 
sian Baltic coast to Riga and beyond. 
Successful. British attempt to capture 
Bagdad (with new army). Successful. 
British attempt to conquer Palestine. 
Successful. 

In the South, German and Austro-Hun- 
garian attempt to break Izonzo line and 
invade northern Italy. Successful. 

Q. — What were the political aims 
of 1917? 

A. — To keep the revolutionary govern- 
ment of Russia in line with Allied mili- 
tary and political aims. Unsuccessful. 
To bring Greece into the war on the side 
of the Allies. Successful. 

Q. — How do retreating armies de- 
stroy stores of grain? 

A. — Great stocks of wheat can of course 
be fired, but they burn very slowly in- 
deed. Petroleum assists the fire, but it 
fails to get far into the stacks. Blow- 
ing up the grain does not get rid of it, 
and there is seldom time for a retreat- 
ing army to stop and load the wheat on 
to trucks, even if these were available 
to take it away. It is difficult to ruin it 
with water, because the water does not 
penetrate far enough. When the Aus- 
trians abandoned Lemberg to the Rus- 
sians early in the war, they attempted to 
destroy the huge stores of wheat they 
had in the city, but the Russians found 
the wheat practically undamaged, although 
the sheltering roofs and wooden walls of 
granaries, etc., had been entirely burned 
away. 



Strategy of the War — Military and Political 



139 



Q. — What were the largest battles 
in the Roumanian campaign? 

A. — The most momentous was fought 
at Targujiu on November 15 and 18, 
1915, when the invading Teutons broke 
the Roumanian resistance in Western 
Wallachia. The other decisive battle was 
fought just a few miles west of Bucha- 
rest on December 1, 2 and 3. 

Q. — What is approximately the 
total area of conquered land 
held by the enemy? 

A. — Owing to the British and French 
successes, the area held in France was a 
constantly decreasing quantity during 
1917. Still the Germans appeared in the 
beginning of 1918 to be in occupation of 
at least 179,400 square miles of Allied 
territory : 

Belgium 1 1,000 square miles 

Poland 49,000 

Courland 10,400 

Kovno 15,500 

Grodno 14,900 

Vilna 8,000 

Volhynia and Minsk 8,000 

Northern Albania . . 6,000 

Montenegro 5,6oo 

Wallachia and Dob- 

rudja 43,ooo 

Northern France . . 8,000 

The Allies held a small portion of 
Alsace, and a narrow strip of Austrian 
territory on the Izonso, not equal to the 
area that the Germans had in Montenegro 
and Albania. Outside of Europe, how- 
ever, the Allies had acquired all the Ger- 
man colonies. 

Q. — Did the Central Powers in- 
crease their acquisition of occu- 
pied territory in 191 8? 

A. — Up to the middle of July,_ 1918, 
they had succeeded in enlarging their mil- 
itary occupation by making a succession 
of powerful drives on wide fronts in 
Flanders, Picardy and the Champagne in 
France. The greatest gain was in Pi- 
cardy, where they won more than 1,000 
square miles by their attack from the line 
Arras-La Fere. In three areas — Picardy 
on the front just named: Flanders, (La 
Bassee to Armentieres and the famous 
Ypres salient), and in the Champagne 
district from the Aisne to the Marne, they 
thus established huge territorial salients 
whose extreme fronts brought German 
armies almost to the farthest line that had 



been reached in the first headlong rush 
toward Paris in 1914. 

Q. — When did the Germans begin 
to lose territory? 

A. — On July 15, 1918, when after a 
sudden but brief German offensive, 
French, American and British troops at- 
tacked heavily all along the lines, first: 
south of Rheims, driving advanced Ger- 
man forces northward across the Marne, 
then along the lines Soissons-Chateau- 
Thierry, taking both, and forcing the 
Germans back into the Aisne district ; sec- 
ond, along the Montdidier-Albert line, 
driving the enemy back there along that 
whole part of the front. These battles 
(or this battle) covered astonishing pe- 
riods of time, for after more than 2 
months of almost uninterrupted fighting 
they were still continuing. 

Q. — What is the greatest mine ex- 
plosion in history? 

A. — At the battle of Messines Ridge, on 
July 7, 1917, the British exploded simul- 
taneously nineteen mines, containing some- 
thing like five hundred tons of high ex- 
plosive, under the German position. The 
British engineers had been driving tun- 
nels beneath the hills held by the op- 
posing forces for an entire year. There 
was an unprecedentedly intense prelimi- 
nary bombardment in which a single 
British division fired 226,000 shells, the 
cannonade being heard in English towns 
130 miles away. The mine was touched 
at 3:10 A. M. Practically the entire 
range was thrown into the air as by a 
volcano, the heavy concrete emplace- 
ments and deep dug-outs of the Germans 
spouting up in small fragments. Some 
of the enemy troops survived the hor- 
ror, but were so dazed that the British 
charge took the entire ridge wTth but little 
resistance. 

Q. — Did the term "Allies" include 
all the nations that entered the 
war against the Central Pow- 
ers? 

A. — Technically, the only "Allies" were 
France, Russia and Great Britain, who 
signed the pact of London, September 5, 
1917, binding themselves not to make 
separate peace. 

Q. — Did not other nations join as 
Allies? 

A. — Japan, although entering the war 
against Germany as a treaty-ally of Great 



140 



Questions and Answers 



Britain as soon as it began, signed the 
separate peace pact some time later. 
Italy signed the pact when she entered 
the war. Since then most of the smaller 
nations that entered the war from time 
to time became signatories to the peace 
pact, and they have all been known as 
Allies. 

Q. — How long are Germany's land 
frontiers? 

A. — The Russian frontier is 843 miles. 
The French frontier is 242 miles. The 
Swiss frontier is 256 miles, and the Hol- 
land frontier is 377 miles. 

Q. — Are the frontiers all guarded 
by forts? 

A. — Yes. The fortress system on the 
French frontier is based on Metz, and the 
Cologne-Koblenz system north of it. The 
Alsace-Lorraine front is guarded by the 
Strassburg-New Breisach system. 

Q. — Is Berlin guarded by forts? 

A. — The Berlin system of fortifications 
is Spandau, Magdeburg, Torgau, Kustrin. 
They form a protective zone about sixty 
miles outside of and around Berlin. 



Q. — What are the distances in the 
European battleground? 

A. — The comparative scale of the areas 
involved is shown by the following dis- 
tances : 

Miles. 

Dover-Brussels 140 

Brussels-Cologne 115 

Paris-Belgian Frontier 115 

Paris-German Frontier 170 

Dover-Calais 21 

London-Wilhelmshaven 400 

Strassburg-French Frontier 30 

Berlin-Warsaw 330 

Berlin-Constantinople 1,699 

Paris-Lille 130 

Calais-Lille 55 

Berlin-Petrograd MSO 

Berlin-Paris 550 

Berlin-Munich 315 

Munich-Paris 430 

Munich-Petrograd 1.300 

Munich-Venice 190 

Munich-Vienna 230 

Vienna-Belgrade 210 

Venice-Austrian Frontier 45 

Galatz-Odessa 140 

Riga-Petrograd 300 



FOREIGN NAVIES 



Q. — Who spent the most on navies 
before the war? 

A. — Great Britain spent about $245,000.- 
000 on her naval establishment in 1913- 
1914. Russia was second with about 
$130,000,000. Third place was held by 
France with $125,000,000. Germany came 
fourth with $115,000,000, and Austria 
spent $37,500,000. Thus the comparative 
pre-war expenditures of the big opposing 
forces were: Allies $500,000,000 (about), 
Central Powers $152,500,000 (about). 

Q._What are "Hush Hush" ships? 

A. — They are a new type of very heav- 
ily armed and armored British ships, 
built in a novel way, very long and very 
low, with a squat central superstructure 
flanked by turrets or barbettes that hold 
two extremely powerful guns. The speed 
is said to be as high as that of battle- 
cruisers, and it is reported that the guns 
throw a 1,900-pound shell. While the only 
information about them has come through 
chance reierences, experts assume thai 
they are outgrowths of the modern battle- 
cruiser principle. 

Q. — What were the German naval 
losses during the whole war? 

A. — The list given in the Proceedings 
of the U. S. Naval Institute, January, 
1918, is : 1 battleship, 1 battle-cruiser, 6 
armored cruisers, 11 protected cruisers, 9 
light cruisers, 11 gunboats, 36 destroyers 
and torpedo-boats, 24 auxiliary cruisers, 
6 small vessels (mine layers, etc.), or 
105 vessels in all, not counting subma- 
rines. The list gives 55 submarines, the 
destruction of most of which appears 
definitely established, and it is undoubted 
that more have been destroyed. 

Q. — How many Allied warships 
does Germany claim to have 
sunk? 

A. — With the sinking of the French 
armored cruiser Chateaurenault Germany 
claimed that 300 different warships, with 
a total tonnage of 1,000,000 tons, belong- 
ing to the Entente Allies have been lost 
since the beginning of the war. Auxiliary 
cruisers to the number of 51, with a ton- 
nage of 358,000, and other ships comman- 
deered for war purposes numbering 38, 
with a registered tonnage of 146,000, 



which have been sunk, are not included in 
the above total. 

The losses of the 300 warships are di- 
vided as follows, according to the Ger- 
man figures : 

Ships. Tons. 

England 177 688,390 

France 48 109,000 

Russia 36 91,540 

Italy 25 76,450 

Japan 8 26,875 

United States, Portugal, 

Roumania 6 8,551 

Thus the warship losses of the Entente 
would about equal the size of the German 
fleet at the beginning of the war, which 
was 1,019,417 tons. 

Q. — What was the total loss of 
British warships? 

1914- 

1915. 1916. 1917. Total 

Gunfire 3 16 4 23 

Submarined 12 3 10 25 

Topedoed by sur- 
face ships 1 1 2 4 

Mined 6 5 9 20 

Collision 4 4 8 

Internal Explo.... 3 1 4 
Foundered and 

stranded 5 . . . . 5 

Total 30 29 30 89 

Add 3 destroyers, the actual cause of 
whose loss — either mine or submarine — 
is uncertain. This estimate is made by 
one writer on naval topics. 

A list printed in the United States 
Naval Institute Proceedings for January, 
1918, gives as the British naval losses : 
2 dreadnaughts, 12 battleships, 13 armored 
cruisers, 10 light cruisers, 44 destroyers 
and torpedo-boats, 15 auxiliary cruisers, 
8 transports, and about 20 small vessels 
(coast guard, etc.), making 124 in all, 
with 14 submarines in addition. 

Q. — What naval strength have the 
neutrals ? 

A. — Switzerland, of course, has no 
ships. Holland proposed recently to build 
nine dreadnaughts, but she had only nine 
coast defense battleships in 1917, some 
cruisers, and forty torpedo-boats ; also 
six submarines, mostly old. Norway, 
likewise, intended to build eight great 



141 



142 



Questions and Answers 



battleships, but relied actually on a few 
gunboats and 37 torpedo-boats. Sweden 
had a dozen coast defense vessels, 53 
torpedo destroyers, and three submarines, 
but during the war added a swift cruiser 
of 7,000 tons to her fleet. The Spanish 
navy consisted of three small dread- 
naughts of 15,400 tons, and half a dozen 
old cruisers, but an ambitious building 
program was begun after the war 
started. 

Q. — Is there great difference be- 
tween British battle cruisers 
and armored cruisers? 

A. — Yes, in size and speed, but espe- 
cially in gun power. The latest of the 
British armored cruisers, the Defence, was 
14,600 tons, had a speed of 23 knots, and 
mounted four 9.2-inch and ten 7.5-inch 
guns. The German Scharnhorst and 
Gneisenau were of this type, but smaller, 
11,400 tons, and eight 8.2-inch guns. The 
Australia, one of the smaller battle- 
cruisers, displaced 18,800 tons, and had a 
designed speed of 25 knots, which has 
been considerably exceeded. She carried 
eight 12-inch guns, and much heavier 
armor than the Defence. 

Q. — Is the British super-dread- 
naught much heavier than 
dreadnaughts? 

A. — Yes, very much so. The differ- 
ence between the two types is in fact 
greater than between the most recent pre- 
dreadnaughts and a dreadnaught. The 
first all-big-gun ship was the British 
Dreadnought, which has given the name 
to this class of battleship. Admiral 
Fisher was responsible for her, and the 
experience of the Russo-Japanese war 
was the direct cause of her building. 
The naval battles in that war proved that 
a heavily armored ship, with big guns, was 
the ship of the future. The heavily pro- 
tected Russian Czarevitch survived the 
smashing gunfire of the Japanese fleet, 
and was the only Russian ship to escape, 
those less well armored being sunk. The 
Dreadnought was 17,000 tons, was en- 
gined with turbines of 23,000 horsepower, 
which developed a speed of 21 knots ; she 
had ten 12-inch guns. The Lord Nelson, 
the last of the pre-dreadnaughts, was 
16,500 tons, 18 knots, had thinner armor, 
and only four 12-inch guns, but carried 
also ten 9.2-inchers. The difference be- 
tween the two was not very great. 

The British call this type "dread- 
nought." The American custom is 
"dreadnaught." 



Q. — Why have British warships 
not operated in the Baltic? 

A. — Because the entrance to the Baltic 
is a "bottle-neck" passage. The British 
fleet would have to force this very narrow 
entrance between Denmark and Sweden at 
immense risk, for the narrowest part of 
this strait (the Cattegat) is so tight that 
it is only a ferry-trip from Copenhagen 
in Denmark to Swedish Elsinore or 
Malmo. 

Since it would be quite impossible for 
the British fleet to advance through such 
a waterway in battle-formation, the Ger- 
man fleet in the Baltic could practically 
select its own way of defense and attack. 

Q. — Is this all that keeps British 
ships out? 

A. — Furthermore, the German ships 
could pour out of the Kiel Canal into the 
North Sea, steam northward and close the 
Cattegat from outside after the British 
fleet had entered, thus locking it up. This 
would mean that a foray into the Baltic 
might, even if successful against German 
forces in the Baltic, end in the total loss 
of the British ships. 

Apart from these two decisive factors, 
a major naval operation in the Baltic is 
practically prohibited by the shoal nature 
of that sea and its extremely intricate and 
dangerous channels. Fighting at the ter- 
rific speed of a modern naval engagement, 
the dreadnaughts would almost inevitably 
run aground sooner or later. 

Q. — How large a fleet had the Rus- 
sians in the Baltic? 

A. — Before the war began the Russian 
fleet in the Baltic consisted of four dread- 
naughts, which had just been completed. 
They were all 23,000 tons, and carried 12- 
inch guns. There were in addition four 
pre-dreadnaught battleships. The oldest 
of these, the Czarevitch, was the largest 
ship the Russians possessed when they 
fought Japan in 1903. There were also 
six armored cruisers, one of which, the 
Pallada, was sunk. 

Q. — Which ships did Japan give 
back to Russia? 

A. — The ships "retroceded" to Russia 
were the battleships Sagami (ex-Peres- 
viet) and Tango (ex-Poltava), and the 
cruiser Soya (ex-Varyag). These were 
all captured in the war of 1904^5. 

Q. — Has Greece any fleet? 

A. — During the Balkan wars the Greek 
fleet dominated the /Egean, owing to the 



Foreign Navies 



143 



fact that in the Georgios Avcroff the 
Greeks had a more powerful ship than 
anything Turkey possessed. This ar- 
mored cruiser, of 9,680 tons, was the gift 
of the Grecian millionaire Averoff to the 
nation. Had this gift not been made the 
Balkan war might have taken a somewhat 
different course. 



Q. — Has Greece any American 
battleships? 

A. — Since that war the Greeks pur- 
chased the two 13,000-ton battleships. 
Idaho and Afississippi, from the United 
States, rechristening them Kilkis and 
Lemnos. They are only xy knots, but both 
carry four 12-inch guns. They also or- 
dered a battle-cruiser of 20,000 tons, the 
Salamis, from Germany, as a reply to 
Turkey's order for two dreadnaughts 
placed in Great Britain. The Salamis was 
acquired by Germany, and probably took 
part in the Jutland battle under another 



Q. — What are the largest British 
naval guns? 

A. — The 15-inch guns of the Queen 
Elizabeth and her sister ships were the 
largest known to be in use. Larger wea- 
pons have, however, been made, and may 
perhaps be mounted on some of the latest 
dreadnaughts. One 16-inch gun made at 
Elswick on the Tyne, weighs 105 tons, 
and fires a shell weighing 2,200 pounds, 
almost exactly a ton. The Krupp 16-inch 
gun weighs only 92 tons, and fires a 
2,028-pound shell. Schneider, the French 
maker, has a 15.7-inch weapon, which 
weighs 102 tons, and has a projectile of 
2,183 pounds. 

Q. — How much does a British 15- 
inch gun weigh? 

A. — From 90 to 95 tons. To quote Mr. 
Winston Churchill : "These guns have 
proved the best we have ever had. Ac- 
curate at all ranges, and exceptionally 
long lived." No fewer than 14 of the 
new British super-dreadnaughts are armed 
with this weapon. Its extreme range is 
21 miles, but, owing to the curvature of 
the earth's surface, its effective range 
would be at the most half that. Even 
then the gunner would not see the ship 
he was firing at, which would be below 
the horizon. The gun would have to be 
laid by the direction from the lookout 
high up the mast ! 



Q. — Could the Germans convert 
existing 12-inch gun ships to 
16-inch? 

A. — It would be possible, but exceed- 
ingly difficult and complicated. At best 
it would be a patchwork affair. It would 
hardly be possible to mount two 15-inch 
guns where two 12-inch guns had been, 
and if only one of the larger types were 
placed where two of the smaller had been, 
the gain would not be enough. The en- 
tire mounting, magazine hoists, etc., would 
have to be altered — renewed, in fact. 

Q.— Is the "Queen Elizabeth" a 
superdreadnaught or a battle 
cruiser? 

A. — She is a superdreadnaught, but im- 
mensely bigger than the old Dreadnought. 
She and her sister ships, the Warspite, 
Valiant and Barham, displace 29,000 tons. 
Her oil-driven turbine engines develop 
45,000 horsepower, and give her a speed 
of 22.5 knots. She has ten 15-inch gu'ns. 
The Tiger, the largest British battle- 
cruiser before the war, is larger, 30,000 
tons; her engines of 110,000 horsepower 
give her the immense speed of 31 knots, 
and she carries eight 13.5-inch guns. 

Q. — Can naval guns be dismounted 
and used in the field? 

A— It is possible to use guns of com- 
paratively small caliber in this way, as 
was done by the British during the Boer 
war. Some time ago it was stated defi- 
nitely that the Germans were using some 
of their 11-inch naval guns among the 
dunes of Flanders, and had bombarded 
Dunkirk therewith. It is far more likely, 
however, that they used army siege guns. 
It was decided in March, 1918, to use 
some of our big naval guns on the French 
front, if necessary, presumably because 
the United States naval gun works had 
.superior facilities for turning out the 
very large guns such as 16-inch. 

Q. — How many rounds can a great 
naval gun fire before wearing 
out? 

A. — Twelve-inch guns, and those of still 
larger size, can fire 90 full charges only. 
After that they are sent to the foundry, 
where they have a new core inserted, 
and can fire a further 90 rounds. By the 
time a gun had fired 180 rounds it used 
to be considered practically obsolete, but 
the war has vastly changed conditions and 
the reclaiming of great guns has advanced 
immensely. 



144 



Questions and Answers 



In time of peace the big guns were nat- 
urally spared carefully and only a few full 
charges were fired in the course of a year. 
For practice, reduced charges were used, 
or a small-caliber gun attached to the 
big gun was fired. 

Q. — What weight projectile do big 
guns fire? 

A. — Twelve-inch guns fire projectiles 
weighing about 850 pounds ; 15-inch guns 
up to 2,000 pounds. 

A rough-and-ready rule for calcula- 
tion is : Cube the caliber of the gun and 
divide the result by two. This rule 
would give you for a 12-inch gun : 1728 
divided by 2 equals 864 (pounds). 

Q. — Is it costly to fire these huge 
guns? 

A. — The Iron Duke has ten 13.5-inch 
guns, and 16 6-inch guns. With all the 
guns in action she uses up powder and 
shot to the value of $50,000 a minute. 
The weight of her broadside is 14,000 
pounds, or more than six tons. 

Q. — What is the penetrating power 
of a twelve-inch gun? 

A. — It will send a projectile through 
three feet of wrought iron at 5,000 yards. 
The latest 15-inch gun will perforate 42.5 
inches of steel at its muzzle. 

Q. — Was a German admiral in com- 
mand of the Turkish fleet? 

A. — The Turkish fleet, such as it is, was 
under the command of Admiral Souchon, 
who, despite his name, is a German. 

Q. — What additions were made to 
the foreign fleets during the 
war? 

A. — Particulars of the ship-building in 
Great Britain naturally were not pub- 
lished, but when war was declared there 
were several super-dreadnaughts of the 
Queen Elisabeth type building, a large 
number of light cruisers and many de- 
stroyers and submarines. In addition 
there were the Turkish and Chilean 
dreadnaughts which were taken over. 

Among the French dreadnaughts were 
the six Dantons, assumed to be the equals 
of the dreadnaughts proper France then 
had in commission. The Danton, which 
gave its name to this class, was sunk on 
March 19, 1917, by a submarine. If the 
French ship-building program was ad- 



hered to, France in 1917 should have had 
nine super-dreadnaughts in addition to 
those in this list. 

Particulars of the German ships built 
since the war began are not available. 

Four Russian dreadnaughts were prac- 
tically ready when the war broke out, and 
three others were building on the Black 
Sea. One of these has been reported 
sunk. Presumably the other two are in 
commission there. 

If the Italian ship-building program 
was carried out, there should have been 
six more super-dreadnaughts in commis- 
sion m 1917. One of the dreadnaughts in 
the list, the Leonardo da Vinci, was blown 
up. 

Q. — What ships building for for- 
eign powers did Great Britain 
take over? 

A. — The dreadnaught originally ordered 
by Brazil, purchased from her by Turkey, 
which was just leaving for Constanti- 
nople. She has been re-christened Agin- 
court. The Reshadieh, another dread- 
naught just completed for Turkey by 
Messrs. Vickers Ltd. Two large de- 
stroyers just ready for delivery to Chile, 
vessels with a displacement of 1,850 tons, 
and a speed of over 31 knots ; also three 
monitors building for Brazil, each mount- 
ing two 6-inch and four 4.7-inch guns. 

Q. — Were the Turks willing to al- 
low their two battleships to 
be taken over? 

A. — They objected strongly and, accord- 
ing to the British ambassador to Con- 
stantinople, the seizure was partly respon- 
sible for the Turkish entry into the strug- 
gle against the Allies. He strongly rec- 
ommended that the British Government 
pay the Turks for the vessels, but the 
British Foreign Secretary objected on the 
ground that it was unwise to pay money 
to an obviously hostile State, and thus 
help to provide her with means. 

Q. — Are the acquired Turkish ships 
powerful ? 

A. — The Agincourt is 27,000 tons and 22 
knots. She has 14 12-inch guns. Origi- 
nally ordered by Brazil, she was christ- 
ened Rio de Janeiro. Turkey purchased 
her, on the stocks, and renamed her Sul- 
tan Osman. She and the Reshadieh, now 
called the Erin, were quite completed, and 
were running their speed trials when Ger- 
many declared war on Russia. It is said 
that Mr. Churchill purchased them on 
his own responsibility, and had a bad 



Foreign Navies 



145 



time in Cabinet in consequence. Had he 
not done so at once, however, they would 
have left British waters, and would now 
be fighting for the Central Powers in the 
East. The Erin has 10 13.5-inch guns, 
and is 23,000 tons displacement. 

Q. — What battleships were build- 
ing in Europe for foreign pow- 
ers? 

A. — Two huge Chilean dreadnaughts 
were building at Newcastle ; also a pro- 
tected cruiser for Siam, and destroyers 
for Brazil and Chile. Germany was build- 
ing several submarines for the smaller 
Powers, and also a few destroyers. In 
addition the Greek battle-cruiser Salanris 
was nearing completion in her yards. 

Q. — Were these the only ships 
which Great Britain took over? 

A. — No. In addition there were six 
Chilean destroyers, each of about 1,800 
tons and 31 knots. Two of these have 
already joined the fleet. They are said 
to have been superior to anything of this 
type in the navy at that time, with the 
single exception of the Swift (2,170 tons). 
The Admiralty also took over three mon- 
itors building for Brazil, which have done 
excellent service off the coast of Belgium 
and elsewhere. 

Q. — How was it possible for Great 
Britain to obtain warships 
from neutrals? 

A. — Ships building in British shipyards 
are liable to purchase by the Admiralty, 
there being a provision in the agreement 
to that effect. Article 6 of the Neutrality 
in Naval War Convention states definitely 
that "the supply on any ground whatever, 
either directly or indirectly, by a neutral 
power to a belligerent power of ships of 
war or munitions of war of any kind is 
forbidden." 

Q. — How many warships has Chile, 
and which are the largest? 

A. — For a long time Chile rested satis- 
fied with the two armored cruisers, Almi- 
rante O'Higgins (8,500 tons), and the 
Esmeralda (7,020 tons), completed for her 
in Great Britain in 1898 and 1897 respec- 
tively. Just before the war, however, she 
had ordered two great dreadnaughts of 
28,000 tons in England. These were near- 
ing completion when the war began, and 
were taken over by the British Admiralty. 



The only other large ship Chile possesses 
is the 24 -year-old battleship Capitan Prat 
(7,000 tons). 

Q. — What is the relative rank of 
the officers in the British navy 
and army? 

A.— -Admirals of the Fleet rank with 
Field-Marshals ; Admirals with Generals ; 
Vice-Admirals with Lieut-Generals ; 
Rear-Admirals with Major-Generals ; 
Commodores with Brigadier-Generals ; 
Captains with Colonels ; Commanders 
with Lieut.-Colonels ; Lieutenants (eight 
years) with Majors; Lieutenants (under 
eight years) with Captains; Sub-Lieuten- 
ants with Lieutenants ; Chief Gunners 
with Second Lieutenants. The Navy is 
the senior service, and always takes prece- 
dence of the Army. 

Q. — How many Australian-born 
men are there in the Australian 
and New Zealand navies? 

A. — There is no New Zealand navy. 
New Zealand paid for the New Zealand 
battle-cruiser, but she is manned by a 
Royal Navy crew. There may be a small 
sprinkling of men aboard her born in 
New Zealand, but they would not amount 
to more than 2 or 3 per cent. 

Q. — Are most of the officers in the 
Australian Navy English? 

A. — Most of the officers are assigned 
from the Royal Navy. Nearly all of the 
executive officers belong to or have re- 
tired from the Royal Navy; a few have 
been entered into the Royal Australian 
Navy from the British merchant service. 
All the senior ranks of engineer officers 
are lent from the Royal Navy, but there 
are about fifteen Australian officers now 
serving who have been entered from the 
Australian Universities, and are holding 
responsible positions. All the surgeons, 
except the director of medical service, 
were obtained in Australia. Practically 
all the warrant officers belong to the Royal 
Navy, or served in the Royal Navy prior 
to joining the Royal Australian Navy per- 
manently. As a general rule, petty officers 
and men with over four years' naval ser- 
vice are from the Royal Navy. All men 
with less than four years' service were ob- 
tained in Australia, but about 25 per cent 
of these were born in England, having 
originally come out as emigrants or as 
firemen, stewards, etc., on merchant 
vessels. 



146 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What is the present strength 
of the British navy? 

A. — On the fourth anniversary of Great 
Britain's entry into the war (August 4, 
1918) the Secretary of the Admiralty an- 
nounced that the British navy possessed 
on that date warships and auxiliary craft 
whose total displacement reached 6,500,000 
tons, against 2,500,000 tons in August, 
1914 During that period about three- 
quarters of a million tons had been lost, 
but the growth of the fleet showed an in- 
crease of 160 per cent by August 4, 1918. 
Similarly, with the personnel, the original 
146,000 officers and men had grown to 
394,000 

Q. — Are submarines being sunk ex- 
tensively now? 

A. — Sir Eric Geddes, First Lord of the 
Admiralty, said in the House of Commons 
on March 5, 1918, that the British and 
American naval forces in the North Sea, 
the North Atlantic, and the English 
Channel were sinking submarines as fast 
as they were built, and on July 30, he 
made the announcement that during the 
last three months of the first half of 1918 
the world's output of tonnage exceeded 
the world's losses from all causes by no 
less than 100,000 tons per month. 

Q. — What has been proved the best 
means of protection? 

A. — "As to the means of defense against 
submarines, figures are now available 
which show that the convoy system has 
played a large part in overcoming the 
submarine menace to the ocean communi- 
cations of the Allies. Whereas in the 
period from April to June of last year, 
before the convoy system was established, 
British steamers sailing to and from the 
United Kingdom in the main overseas 
trades suffered losses through enemy ac- 
tion of 5.41 per cent of their total num- 
ber, the figures since then have ste?dilv 
diminished, until in the period from 



March to June of this year, during which 
93.8 per cent of the ships were convoyed, 
the losses had dropped to 1.23 per cent of 
the total number of sailings in these 
trades." — Statement published in August, 
1918. 

Q. — Were all the losses in uncon- 
voyed ships? 

A. — Not all, but largely. Only 0.61 per 
cent of convoyed tonnage was lost. Of 
61,691,000 tons convoyed since the intro- 
duction of the system, only 373,000 tons 
had been lost. 

Q. — What is a gun-layer? 

A. — This is the British naval term for 
the sailor in a gun-crew who "lays" the 
gun — that is, points it when it is ready 
to fire. In the American Navy he i^ 
called "gun-pointer' and the position is 
one that is eagerly competed for and much 
envied. 

Q. — What is the difference be- 
tween a raider and an auxiliary 
merchantman ? 

A. — "Raider" is merely the descriptive 
word for a ship which preys on hostile 
commerce. It may be any kind of a ves- 
sel, a warship or an armed merchantman, 
which latter is usually called an auxiliary 
cruiser. 

Q. — Could warships be protected 
with concrete? 

A. — Some naval engineers have pro- 
posed systems for using concrete instead 
of armor. The essential idea is to use 
several layers of concrete between steel 
armor-plates. The concrete would have 
to be from 3 to 4 feet thick, and for such 
places as turrets there would be almost 
equal thickness of concrete and armor 
combined. The idea has not gone beyond 
theory. 



SOLDIERS OF THE ALLIES 



Q. — What was Great Britain's 
strength when war began? 

A. — The entire military strength was 
about 250,000 in the regular army, 200,000 
reserves (men who had served in the reg- 
ular army and had returned to civil life) 
and a little over 250,000 of the partially 
trained militia known as "territorials." 
This is counting the regular British army 
in India, but excluding the native Indian 
army, etc. 



Q. — How were these British forces 
distributed in normal times ? 

A. — 127,400 in the United Kingdom ; 77,- 
300 in India; 12,500 in Ceylon and China; 
11,850 in South Africa; 6,500 in Egypt 
and Cyprus; 7,500 in Malta; 4,120 in Gib- 
raltar ; and 6,600 variously scattered in 
stations and Crown Colonies. 



Q. — What troops had Great Brit- 
ain in India? 

A. — Besides the British regiments, 77,- 
300 strong, there were 162,000 native 
troops, 28,500 military police, 96,400 vol- 
unteers, reserves, etc. 



Q. — What is the present enrollment 
in the British armies? 

A. — In March, 1918 the total enrollment 
in the British Armies was 7,500,000 men. 
To this total England contributed 4,530,- 
000 ; Scotland 620,000 ; Wales 280,000 ; 
Ireland 170,000 ; the dominions and colo- 
nies 900,000. The remaining 1,000,000, 
composed of native fighting troops, labor 
corps, carriers, etc., were from India, 
Africa and other dependencies. 



Q. — How many soldiers were 
raised in Canada? 

m A. — Up to June 1, 1918, Canada had en- 
listed 550,000 men, of whom all but 70,000 
were volunteers. As many thousands had 
enlisted in the British army, it is esti- 
mated that Canada's total contribution has 
been about 600,000, or about 8 per cent of 
the total population. Canada, with a 
population of 7Y 2 millions, maintains 4 
divisions of about 80,000 men in France. 



Q. — What was the size of the first 
expeditionary force? 

A. — The first British expeditionary 
force was 160,000. It arrived in France in 
mid-August and was on the line during 
the Battle of the Marne. 

Q. — Who spent the most money on 
armies before the war? 

A. — Germany spent about $340,000,000 
on her army organization in 1913-1914. 
Russia came second with about $330,000,- 
000. France followed with $240,000,000, 
and Great Britain came next with $140,- 
000,000. Austria was behind them all, 
spending "only" $120,000,000. Thus the 
comparative expenditures of the big op- 
posing forces were : Allies $710,000,000 
(about), Central Powers $460,000,000 
(about). 

Q. — What are the military forces 
of the neutral countries? 

A. — Switzerland has no permanent army 
to speak of. Her citizen soldiers number 
about 200,000. Particulars given as to the 
strength of the military forces vary con- 
siderably. The following is approxi- 
mately correct: — 

Peace War 

establishment, strength. 

Spain 128,000 300,000 

Holland 22,000 200,000 

Denmark 14,000 83,000 

Sweden 84,000 200,000 

Norway 18,000 70,000 

Q. — What were the Territorials? 

A. — The "Terriers," as they were called, 
took the place in England of the old 
volunteers. Members of this force had 
to enlist for three years, and during that 
time were liable to be called upon for 
active service at home. Like our State 
militia, they could only be sent abroad 
if they volunteered. This they did almost 
in a body, and they were the first troops 
after the regulars to reach France. 



-How many 
there ? 



"Terriers" were 



147 



A— In April, 1913, there were 263,000. 
That is 50,000 less than the figures com- 



148 



Questions and Answers 



puted for the entire "establishment." 
Recruiting was, however, brisk during 
1913, and this deficiency was considerably 
reduced. 

Q. — What was Great Britain's total 
effective force at the outbreak 
of war? 

A. — 596,000, made up as follows : Regi- 
ments in the United Kingdom, 127,400 ; 
Army reserves, 142,000 ; special reserves, 
61,000; territorials, 263,000; and 3,000 
more or less unattached. If, however, the 
British troops in India and oversea be in- 
cluded, and also the Indian Army, Great 
Britain had a total strength of just under 
a million men, and those were standing 
troops ready for instant service. 

Q. — Are the Zouaves Frenchmen 
or colored troops? 

A. — The Zouaves are the professional 
soldiers of France, and are basically 
Frenchmen. They were originally sta- 
tioned in Northern Africa, hence the 
semi-Moorish uniform. They are long 
service men, and are not conscripted, but 
are much like the men who enlist in our 
regular army. As in our regular army, 
there may be (and are) Zouave regiments 
made of colored troops ; but the Zouave 
organization is French, not foreign. 

Q. — Has Portugal taken active 
part in the war? 

A. — Yes. She has sent two full di- 
visions to France since January 1, 1917, 
and a third division is being trained. In 
less than a year Portugal has furnished 
75,000 soldiers, and has 100,000 more in 
reserve, trained. Her divisions are joined 
to the British forces. 

Q. — What wages do the soldiers of 
the belligerents receive per 
day? 

A. — Great Britain gives is. 2d. (29 
cents) ; Germany, 5 cents ; France, 3 cents ; 
Canada, $1.12; New Zealand, $1.25; 
and Australia, $1.50. The rate of pay in 
the Austrian Army is about the same as 
in the German. 

Q. — How would the daily army 
pay-bills of the nations com- 
pare? 

A. — That of Great Britain probably 
would be about' six times that of Ger- 
many, while Australia appears to be pa3 f - 
ing every day in wages twice as great a 



sum as that paid by the Kaiser to his 
millions of soldiers. The total under 
arms can, of course, only be estimated, as 
accurate particulars are not available. 
The daily wage bill probably is about as 
follows : 

Germany, with, say, 5,000,000 

in arms $ 250,000 

France, with, say, 3,500,000 

in arms 105,000 

Great Britain, with, say, 

5,000,000 in arms 1,450,000 

Australia, with, say, 300,000 

in arms 450,000 



Q. — How are the ranks named in 
the Indian army? 

A. — Subadar, Captain ; Jemadar, Lieu- 
tenant ; Havildar, Sergeant; Naik, Cor- 
poral; Sepoy, Private of infantry; Sowar, 
Trooper of cavalry; Duffadar, Sergeant 
of cavalry. 

Q. — Were all the soldiers sent from 
Australia Australian born? 

A. — Some 75 per cent, it is believed, 
were born there, and 25 per cent were 
born outside of Australia, the great ma- 
jority in Britain. 

Q. — Were the Irish first to land on 
Gallipoli? 

A. — They were the first to get ashore 
(on April 25, 1915), though parties of 
naval men had landed before for brief 
periods. The famous River Clyde had 
about 2,300 Irishmen on board, the Dub- 
lins and the Munsters, and two com- 
panies of the Hampshire regiment, who 
were brigaded with them. Some Dublins 
also landed in open boats. The Turkish 
positions had been shelled for hours by 
the British fleet, and the enemy had given 
no reply whatever. The moment the 
Irishmen approached the shore, however, 
rifles and machine guns and pom-poms 
opened fire, and they were practically 
wiped out. Of the thousand men who 
left the River Clyde in the morning, 700 
were killed, drowned or wounded. How- 
ever, a landing was forced in the end. 
A Scottish officer who saw the amazing 
landing over submerged wire entangle- 
ments in face of the terrific fire said : "It 
is but the merest truth to state that there 
would be no Dardanelles campaign heard 
of to-day if it had not been for the ex- 
traordinary services of these Irish troops, 
white men every one." 



Soldiers of the Allies 



149 



Q. — How many British were at the 
battle of Mons? 

A. — Sir John French had two army 
corps with him, roughly 75,000 men with 
250 guns. During that fight and in the 
retreat to the Marne, some 17,000 men 
were taken prisoners, and the losses in 
killed and wounded were severe. When 
the offensive began at the Marne, French 
had been reinforced by a third army corps, 
but he probably had only 100,000 men 
under his command altogether. 

Q. — Who was in command of the 
Polish Legion in the enemy's 
forces? 

A. — Neutral papers have stated that the 
commander in 1916 was Field-Marshal 
Lieutenant von Durski, himself a Pole, 
who, after the campaign which drove the 
Russians entirely out of Poland, united 
the three brigades of the Polish Legions 
into one command. These brigades had 
been fighting in different districts pre- 
viously. One brigade composed of Aus- 
trian Poles had been fighting continu- 
ously in Galicia. Another, consisting of 
men who had been dwelling in Poland 
proper, was engaged before Warsaw, and 
the third, consisting of German Poles, 
was operating farther north. The Polish 
Legions appear to have distinguished 
themselves greatly in the field. 

Q. — What became of the Indian 
troops who were in France in 
1915? 

A. — They were withdrawn from the 
west front and sent to Egypt. From 
there some were sent to Mesopotamia, a 
few returned to India, and a few appear 
to have gone to German East Africa. 

Q. — How many men were with 
General Smuts? 

A. — According to General Botha, who 
gave the information to the House of As- 
sembly in Capetown, 20,000 men were sent 
from South Africa to fight in German 
East Africa. Troops also went from 
India and a few from England. As the 
campaign progressed, however, many of 
the white fighters were withdrawn, and 
in the end the army consisted heavily of 
colored soldiers, the majority being Af- 
rican natives. 

Q. — How large was the German 
army in East Africa? 

A. — There were 2,000 whites. The 
number of natives is not known, but is 
estimated at about 20,000. 



Q. — How many troops had von 
Mackensen to invade Serbia? 

A. — It is believed that he had 40,000 
men available. In addition a small Aus- 
trian army entered Serbia from Bosnia, 
and the Bulgarians swarmed across from 
the East. Probably by the time the con- 
quest of Serbia was completed 750,000 
enemy troops were in the country. 

Q. — How many troops did India 
send to the front? 

A. — The exact number has not been 
published, but in 1916 the Secretary of 
State for India said that when the war 
began, India offered -seven and one-third 
divisions of infantry and five cavalry bri- 
gades. That would appear .to mean about 
140,000 infantry and 9,000 mounted men, 
with all necessary equipment, horses, guns, 
etc. In August, 19 14, two divisions of in- 
fantry and one of cavalry were sent to 
France, and two cavalry brigades fol- 
lowed later. This would make in all 
46,000 men. A division, 20,000 men, was 
sent to British East Africa. In October, 
when Turkey declared war, a division was 
sent to Mesopotamia, and another fol- 
lowed quickly, making 40,000 men there 
in all. In November, a brigade of cavalry 
and a division of infantry were sent to 
Egypt, 22,000 men. That is 128,000 fight- 
ing men. All these forces were trans- 
ferred to their various destinations, com- 
plete with ambulances and general hos- 
pital. Presumably reinforcements have 
been sent to keep these armies up to full 
strength, although the Minister did not 
say this. Three divisions were mobilized 
to cope with the troubles on the north- 
west frontier, and, in addition, British 
infantry and artillery were set free for 
use outside of India. 

Q. — What is the French Foreign 
Legion? 

A. — The Foreign Legion is the name by 
which the world best knows the Regi- 
ments etrangers in the French service. 
This legion is composed of adventurous 
spirits of all nationalities, and has long 
been employed in colonial campaigns. 
For a long time it was stationed in Al- 
geria. All sorts and conditions of men 
are to be found in it, for courage is prac- 
tically the sole criterion that governs 
enlistment. No inquiry is made into their 
previous careers. French, British, Ger- 
mans, Americans, Russians — in fact, al- 
most every nationality is to be found in 
the ranks. The commanding officers are 
French. The Legion has done excellent 



150 



Questions and Anszvers 



service during the great war, and has suf- 
fered very heavy casualties. 

Q. — Has the color of the French 
uniform been changed since 
the war began? 

A. — Yes. It has been done slowly. A 
year or so before the outbreak of war, 
great efforts were made to introduce a 
uniform less conspicuous than the blue 
and red that the Republic's soldiers had 
always worn, but the scheme met with 
so much opposition that it was dropped. 
The new uniform is bluish-green, but, ac- 
cording to statements in technical dye 
journals, it loses its color quickly. The 
steel helmet, which has replaced the 
jaunty cap, is an equally useful change. 

Q. — How large is the Greek army? 

A. — The peace strength in 1915 was 
60,000 men. The war strength was esti- 
mated as about 300,000. During the re- 
cent Balkan wars, Greece put ten divisions 
of 12,000 men in the field. Most of the 
artillery was obtained in France, but the 
rifles were of Austrian make. 

Q. — What is the population of 
Greece? 

A. — The population of Greece proper, 
according to the census of 1907, was 
2,630,000; at that time its area was 25,- 
000 square miles. Since then the Epirus 
and many ^gean Islands have been add- 
ed, and also portions of Macedonia, con- 
quered from Turkey in 1913, which make 
the total area 42,000 square miles, and 
the total population about 4,800,000. 

Q. — Do all the troops at the front 
wear khaki? 

A. — The Americans and British do, and 
the Germans have a field-gray uniform, 
which is even less visible than khaki. 
The French troops now have dull green 
uniforms. The Russians had a dark green 
uniform with red epaulettes, the Belgians 
a bluish-gray outfit. 

Our own troops have worn the standard 
light brown khaki-color service uniforms 
for more than 20 years. The American 
color, while apparently quite pronounced 
when the uniforms are seen in cities, is 
excellent for low visibility against nearly 
every kind of landscape. 

Q. — Are the Austrians strong 
fighters ? 

A. — On the whole, the Austrians have 
made a poor showing in this war. Any 



victories have been due largely to Ger- 
man assistance or to the weakness of their 
foe. In one respect the Austrian armies 
have been second to none — in their heavy 
artillery. The excellent artillery service 
of the dual empire forced the Italians to 
fight their way inch by inch through the 
mountains, and at all times Italy has been 
inferior to her enemy in this arm. The 
Austrians have been especially ingenious 
In developing heavy trench mortars, some 
of them hurling hundreds of pounds of 
high explosive into the opposing trenches. 

Q. — Did Portugal greatly help the 
Allies before she joined them? 

A. — As soon as hostilities began she 
declared her willingness to throw in her 
lot with the Allies whenever Great Brit- 
ain so desired. Germany, before Portu- 
gal formally entered the war against her, 
protested strongly against the way in 
which the Portuguese permitted the vio- 
lation of their neutrality by allowing Brit- 
ish warships to use their harbors and 
granting permission to British troops to 
cross the colony of Mozambique to attack 
German East Africa. The Kaiser also 
protested against Portugal's practice in 
allowing Great Britain to use Madeira as 
a naval base. 

Q. — What is meant by the "Bat- 
talion of Death"? 

A. — A fighting legion of women and 
girls of all classes in Russia, organized in 
1917, and commanded by Madame Botch- 
kalov, a Russian revolutionist. They be- 
came a part of the Russian army and took 
brilliant part in several engagements. 

Q. — Did the Vatican spread disrup- 
tive propaganda among the 
Italian troops? 

A. — The New York newspapers of Jan- 
uary 30, 1918, published the following 
statement : 

Denials from the Pope's Minister of 
Foreign Affairs, the Prime Minister of 
Italy, and others that the Pope was re- 
sponsible for spreading disruptive propa- 
ganda or for the Italian disaster were 
made public by Adrian Iselin, Chairman 
of a committee of Catholic laymen. 

This information was contained in a 
letter by F. C. Walcott of the United 
States Food Administration, in retracting 
a statement which he had made. 

Mr. Walcott said : 

"My statement attributed to the Pope a 
measure of responsibility for the Italian 
disaster, and for the disruptive propa- 



Soldiers of the Allies 



151 



ganda which had brought it about. I 
repeated thoughtlessly and without pre- 
vious reflection a rumor I had heard, 
which I had not verified, and which 1 
am now .convinced and believe was un- 
true. I have since read the categorical 
denial of Cardinal Gasparri, the Pope's 
Minister of Foreign Affairs, and the de- 
nial of Cardinal Bourne in London, and 
I have also read the statement recently 
made by Signor Orlando, the Prime Min- 
ister of Italy, in the Italian Chamber of 
Deputies. 

"I therefore feel that it is my duty to 
retract the statement I made in regard 
to the Pope, which I do without reserve, 
and I would like to correct the unfortu- 
nate and erroneous impression my remarks 
tended to create." 

Q. — Did the Pope induce the 
Turks to respect British 
graves on Gallipoli? 

A. — Yes. He communicated * with the 
Turkish Government in the matter, 
through the Apostolic Delegate at Con- 
stantinople. Enver Pasha, in reply, as- 
sured him that the graves and the 
religious emblems that adorned them 
would be carefully protected. As a mark 
of his esteem for the Pope he had photo- 
graphs taken of the graves and sent to 
Rome. 

Q. — What is the origin of the word 
"Anzac"? 

A. — It was a composite word used as 
the name of the British colonial troops in 
the romantic, though unsuccessful, Galli- 
poli undertaking. The men were from 
Australia and New Zealand, and, as their 
organization was officially known as the 
Australian-New Zealand Army Corps, the 
initial letters of this long title were put 
together to form the new word. 

Q. — What is the fate of a captured 
newspaper correspondent? 

A. — The enemy should treat him as a 
prisoner of war, provided he can produce 
or obtain a certificate from the military 
authorities of the army he was accom- 
panying. 

Q. — What is the fate of a non- 
combatant with arms in his 
hands? 

A. — The rules of war permit his being 
shot without mercy. His position is a 
little better now than it was before the 
Hague Conference of 1907. It was agreed 
there that if he carries arms openly and 
respects the laws and customs of war, he 



must be regarded as a belligerent. He 
must, however, wear some sort of a uni- 
form or badge, which can be recognized 
at a distance, and which cannot be re- 
moved at will. This was urged by Eng- 
land and France, who desired to legalize 
the position of volunteers and irregulars, 
who previously were only entitled to be 
regarded as belligerents by the courtesy 
of their foe. 

Q. — If a civilian, to defend his 
home, used a rifle, would he 
be shot if captured? 

A. — Certainly he would. 

Q. — But is that .not murder? 

A. — War, says General Sherman, is hell. 
But the rule forbidding civilians to resort 
to arms is absolutely necessary for the 
protection of all non-combatants. If ci- 
vilians were permitted to fight, no troops 
would venture to enter a village or town 
until they had killed or driven out every- 
one in it. The troops alone must carry 
on war. The rest of the nation must re- 
main at peace. 

Q. — Have reprisals in previous 
wars brought about desired 
results? 

A. — As a general rule, they have failed 
entirely, but in previous wars only a very 
small part of the entire communities of 
the countries at war were at all concerned. 
In The Laws and Usages of War, issued 
by the British War Office in 1914, various 
examples are given. 

After such outrages as the German 
bombings of coast towns of no military 
importance there is always a loud demand 
from those who have suffered for similar 
action against the enemy. 

It can be argued logically, too, that 
there is a certain kind of mentality which 
can apparently be impressed in no other 
way ; hence,' when one finds one's self 
in a conflict with such a barbarous-minded 
foe, there is no help for it save to fight 
him with his own weapons. 

Beyond a question the threat of re- 
prisals has often been effective in re- 
straining such an enemy from going to 
the lengths he announced. The most 
scrupulous governments and com- 
manders have not hesitated to pro- 
tect their citizens by intimating that 
cruelties practised upon them would be 
met in kind. 

Of course, as a general principle, re- 
prisals are worse than ineffective — for 
they injure the morale of the nation 
adopting them and frequently cause in- 
creased savagery all round. 



152 



Questions and Answers 



In this connection, it is worth noting 
that at the conference in 1917 between 
British and German delegates at The 
Hague it was decided that all reprisals 
should be abandoned, and both sides 
undertook to withdraw all prisoners 
from the war zones in the west. 

Q. — How do people in the con- 
quered French provinces ob- 
tain news? 

A. — The Germans publish a news- 
paper called Gazette des Ardennes, 
100,000 copies of which are circulated, 
chiefly through the post, three times 
a week. It gives the German side en- 
tirely. 

Q.— Will the shell-filled battle- 
grounds not be dangerous for 
farmers ? 

A. — The danger has been realized. 
Unless something is done it would be 
quite possible for a ploughman to 
strike a shell with sufficient force to 
kill him or blow his horses to pieces. 
Various solutions of the problem have 
been suggested. A French scientist has 
perfected an electrical instrument 
which will give warning when a mass 
of metal is near. The apparatus re- 
quires the services of two men. They 
can explore an acre thoroughly in 
about an hour, and discover every 
shell near enough to the surface to do 
any harm. 

Q. — What is the British law re- 
ferred to as "Dora"? 

A. — "Dora" is the nickname or ab- 
breviation for the Defense of the Realm 
Act. 

Q. — How many English horses 
were bought for war? 

A. — The figures for 1916 show that 
during that year 400,000 horses had 
been purchased at a cost of almost 
$100,000,000 which works out at an 
average of nearly $250 each. 

Q. — Is it true that the English 
censor expurgated Kipling's 
verse? 

A. — He cut out a couple of words from 
a quotation from Kipling's Recessional, 
which a correspondent at the front was 



ill-advised enough to put in one of his 
despatches. The particular lines which 
fell under the censor's ban were : 

"The tumult and the shouting dies 
The captains and the kings depart." 

The censor put his pen through "and 
the kings," for it was obviously dangerous 
to refer to the movements of kings in this 
reckless way! Curiously enough Kipling 
got into trouble over the same pair of 
lines fifteen years ago. It was the censors 
of language, the grammarians and their 
devoted followers who pitched into him 
then, and they objected to the first line on 
the ground that it is customary to pro- 
vide a plural subject with a plural verb. 
The Kiplingites rushed to the defense of 
their master, and argued that tumult and 
shouting meant the same thing, and that 
the subject was "psychologically singu- 
lar." 



Q. — What do the letters behind 
English names mean? 

A. — A few of the most usual are ab- 
breviated as follows : O.M. signifies Or- 
der of Merit, and is the only honor con- 
ferred without the recipient's consent 
having first been obtained ; K.G., Knight 
of the Garter; K.T., Knight of the This- 
tle.; K.P., Knight of St. Patrick; K.C.B., 
Knight Commander of the Bath ; G.C.B., 
Knight Grand Cross of the Bath ; C.B., 
Companion of the Bath ; K.C.S.I., Knight 
Grand Commander of the Star of In- 
dia ; C.S.I., Companion of the Star of 
India; G.C.M.G. and K.C.M.G., Knight 
Grand Cross and Knight Commander re- 
spectively of St. Michael and St. George ; 
C.M.G., Companion of that Order; GCI. 
E. and K.C.I.E., Knight Grand Cross and 
Knight Commander of the Indian Em- 
pire; C.V.O., Commander of the Victor- 
ian Order; D.S.O., Distinguished Service 
Order. The above are given in order of 
precedence. Other letters used are : P.C., 
Privy Councillor ; V.C, Victoria Cross ; 
L.H., Legion of Honor. 

Q. — Who were the Franc-Tireurs? 

A. — They were irregular bands of 
Frenchmen who waged a guerilla warfare 
against the German invaders in 1871. 
The Germans did not recognize them as 
belligerents unless they wore a uniform. 
When caught without one, they were sum- 
marily shot. The shooting of non-com- 
batants who have taken up arms is the 
military act of force which gives rise to 
the wildest stories and also deeds of cold- 
blooded murder in all wars. 



RAVAGED BELGIUM 



Q. — Did Germany issue an ultima- 
tum to Belgium? 

A. — Yes. At 7 p.m., on August 2, 1914, 
Herr Von Biilow delivered Germany's ul- 
timatum, which was in effect an an- 
nouncement of Germany's intention to 
violate Belgium's neutrality forcibly if 
necessary. Belgium's resolve to uphold 
her own neutrality was given to the Ger- 
man ambassador within twenty-four 
hours. German}', however, had not 
waited for a response, but had already 
invaded Belgian soil at Vide. 

Q. — Did Germany ever confess that 
entrance into Belgium was a 
violation of treaty? 

A. — The German Chancellor acknowl- 
edged the entrance into Belgium as a. 
violation of treaty and characterized it 
as a "wrong dictated by military neces- 
sity." The Kaiser in a message to Presi- 
dent Wilson, dated August 10, 1914, 
through Mr. Gerard, speaks of it as "Bel- 
gian neutrality which had to be violated 
by Germany on strategical grounds." 

Q. — Did the United States ac- 
knowledge the right of Ger- 
many to take Belgium? 

A. — No. Mr. Whitlock remained ac- 
credited to the Belgian government. Ger- 
many holds the occupied part of Belgium 
by martial law alone. 

Q. — Who was Belgian prime min- 
ister at outbreak of war? 

A. — Baron de Brocqueville was the 
Premier and Minister of War. These 
two offices are vested in one minister. 

Q. — Under what rule is Luxem- 
bourg at present? 

A. — German troops invaded Luxem- 
bourg on Sunday morning, August 2, in 
order (according to the German govern- 
ment) to assure the use of the railways, 
which had been leased to Germany, and 
they now occupy it. 

Q. — Is Luxembourg a neutral still? 

A. — Probably she is. technically. Lux- 
embourg protested against the violation of 
its neutrality and against the expulsion 
of the French ambassador on August 4. 



But the duchy is said to have received 
about $256,000 indemnity, because it re- 
frained from armed resistance, and ac- 
ceptance of this may be held to have 
clouded the title to neutrality. However, 
Luxembourg appears still to be considered 
neutral and independent. Its ruler is 
Grand-Duchess Marie-Adelaide. 

Q. — What became of English and 
French properties in Belgium? 

A. — The American ambassador, Mr. 
Whitlock, assumed the French and Brit- 
ish legations as well as the German and 
Austrian, protecting as best he could all 
their interests. The Germans, however, 
have shown small regard for the property 
or rights of any other nation, enemy or 
otherwise. 

Q. — Was Brussels besieged by the 
Germans ? 

A. — No. Mr. Whitlock, the American 
ambassador, realizing the futility of at- 
tempting a defense, urged upon the Bel- 
gian General Staff that they surrender the 
city without resistance, hoping thereby to 
save not only the lives of the inhabitants, 
but the historic buildings, art treasures, 
etc. The Germans took the city without 
a siege on August 20, 1914. 

Q. — Was Belgium an entirely inde- 
pendent country? 

A. — Belgium is an independent consti- 
tutional monarchy with a national exist- 
ence dating to 1830, when by a revolution 
it separated itself from Holland with 
which it had been combined in 1815 by 
the Congress of Vienna. Belgium has a 
King, a House of Parliament (Senate and 
a Chamber of Deputies) elected by popu- 
lar suffrage. There are three powerful 
political parties : Catholic, Liberal, and 
Socialist. Belgian neutrality was guar- 
anteed in 1839 by England, Russia, France 
and Germany as a mutually protective 



Q. — Are the Belgians a homogene- 
ous race? 
A. — There are two lingually distinct 
peoples — Walloons and Flemings. The 
Walloons dwell in the Provinces of 
Hainault, Namur, Liege, and parts of 
Luxembourg and South Brabant. A few 



153 



154 



Questions and Answers 



live in the French departments of Nord 
and Ardennes. They resemble the French 
in vivacity and adaptability. There were 
about 2,600,000 of them, and their literary 
tongue is French while their dialect is 
Romanesque. 

The Flemings live in Flanders, and at 
one time were an important industrial 
autonomous community. Their country 
was bounded by the Scheldt, the North 
Sea, and the Somme, and has always been 
much fought over, but, nevertheless, has 
always preserved active industrial inter- 
ests. About 3,500,000 Flemings live in 
Belgium. Their language may be de- 
scribed as a sort of southern Dutch. 
Some 2,000,000 speak nothing else, but 
many speak Flemish and French. 

Q. — Was there a movement for 
Flemish separation? 

A. — In 1917 some Flemings who called 
themselves "Activists" and were highly 
favored by the German occupying au- 
thorities, created a "Council of Flanders" 
of about 70 members and proclaimed a 
separation of Belgium into two admin- 
istrative divisions — the northern Flemish 
in speech with Brussels as capital, the 
southern French speaking with Namur as 
capital. They proclaimed the "political 
independence" of Flanders January 14, 
1918. Prominent Belgians such as Car- 
dinal Mercier, civil authorities, etc., pro- 
tested passionately. Brand Whitlock, 
American Ambassador to Belgium, said 
of it March 18, 1918, that it was "worst 
of all the terrible deeds that Germany 
has committed in Belgium ; worse than 
the atrocities, worse than deportations. 
They killed the body: this would kill the 
soul." 

Q. — Did the Belgian authorities ac- 
knowledge the separation? 

A. — No. In February, 1918, the Bel- 
gian Court of Appeals in Brussels or- 
dered prosecution of the "Activists" for 
treason in plotting against the form of 
government established by the Belgian 
Constitution. Several leaders were ar- 
rested. 

Q. — Were the Belgian courts in 
force? 

A. — Yes. The process of the court 
was executed. However, the Germans 
took a hand then. They declared that 
the Belgian judges had exceeded their au- 
thority, and when the arrested men were 
sentenced, they ordered their release. The 
judges refused, and were arrested in their 



turn. The Belgian courts went on strike 
as protest, and still were on strike in 
August, 1918. German courts were then 
created by the invaders. 

Q. — Do Flemings and Walloons 
naturally wish to separate? 

A. — The Activist movement obviously 
was fostered by the Germans. Flemings 
and Walloons, it is true, have long had 
some diverging views. Flemings had 
felt that they were dominated unduly by 
Walloons. Some years before the war, 
there was a great "Flemish revival," led 
by such men as Huysmans. But this was 
in the direction of reinstating Flemish 
literature and language, and it aimed only 
toward cultural development within the 
Belgian State. 

Q. — Was Belgian neutrality differ- 
ent from other neutrality? 

A. — Yes. The neutrality of the big na- 
tions like the United States, Great Brit- 
ain, Germany, etc., in case of a war be- 
tween other nations, is something for 
each to decide for itself. It may remain 
neutral or not just as it chooses. If it 
chooses not to be neutral, it must, of 
course, accept the risk that goes with its 
position, but it has the right to do what it 
wishes. Belgium was different from this ; 
Belgium's neutrality was an obligation on 
her part. She was bound by treaty to 
maintain her neutrality. It was a con- 
tract between herself and Great Britain, 
France and Germany; and these powers 
in turn, agreed to respect her neutrality 
and to prevent any violation of it by 
anybody. 

Q. — What were the Belgian de- 
portations ? 

A. — The German army authorities early 
sent considerable groups of the popula- 
tion to Germany on various grounds, some 
as hostages, others in punishment for of- 
fenses charged against the civilian popula- 
tion of various districts, others for 
refusing to work for the invaders. The 
general order (issued October 12, 1915) 
was that persons who refused work suit- 
able to their occupation and in which 
the military administration was inter- 
ested, were subject to a year's imprison- 
ment or deportation to Germany. In 
October, 1916, there began wholesale de- 
portation for v/ork in Germany. It 
started in Ghent and Bruges, spread to 
other districts, and continued for more 
than a year. 



Ravaged Belgium 



155 



Q. — Were many Belgians deported 
to Germany? 

A. — Between 100,000 to 300,000, accord- 
ing to varying estimates. In a report 
(January, 1917) to the State Department, 
Brand Whitlock said : "The rage, terror 
and despair excited by this measure all 
over Belgium were beyond anything we 
had witnessed since the day the Germans 
poured into Brussels. ... In tearing 
away from nearly every humble home a 
husband and a father or a son and a 
brother, they have lighted a fire of hatred 
that will never go out." 

Q. — Would it cost Germany more 
to restore Belgium or to con- 
tinue war? 

A. — The very lowest estimate of Ger- 
many's war-cost was $127,000,000 a week. 
That estimate was made early in 1917, 
before we entered the war, and it did 
not take into account the steadily rising 
cost week after week. It is fair to as- 
sume that even if the German expenses 
are less than those of the Allies, the 
weekly cost in March, 1918, had risen to 
$140,000,000 at least. Assuming that 
Liege, Louvain, Tournai, Courtrai and 
Vervieres had been entirely destroyed 
(which is not correct, as the destruction 
is only partial), Germany could prob- 
ably pay the total value of these five 
cities alone out of three weeks' war- 
costs. An estimate of the values of five 
of our very important New England 
manufacturing towns (calculated in 1915 
by military experts to estimate the pos- 
sible cost of invasion to America) gives 
their value as $483,000,000. 

Q. — What damages could Germany 
pay Belgian sufferers with one 
week's war-cost? 

A. — She could pay each and every in- 
habitant of Vervieres, Louvain, Tournai, 
Courtrai, Namur, Mons and Charleroi al- 
most $1,000. 

She could pay for almost all the for- 
ests of Belgium (estimating their value 
as based on the Belgian revenues from 
forests products). Or she could pay 
damages amounting to more than $10,000 
for every square mile of Belgian terri- 
tory. Or she could pay three times over 
for every bit of live stock that existed 
in Belgium before the war. 

Q. — How many houses were de- 
stroyed in all Belgium? 

A. — According to a report issued of- 
ficially by the Belgian Government, the 



total number of buildings destroyed in 
the whole country was estimated on 
May 1, 1916, as 43,198. 

Q. — What was wanton destruction 
mostly ? 
A— The Belgian official commission 
said in its report that it was not pos- 
sible to make distinction between build- 
ings destroyed by acts of war and those 
which were destroyed as punishment for 
alleged hostile acts of the population. 
The report added: "It can be admitted 
at once that the destruction of buildings 
in West Flanders is due almost entirely 
to bombardments, and it is estimated, on 
the other hand, that at least 20,000 build- 
ings in the rest of the country have been 
set afire by the German armies under 
pretext of reprisals." 

Q. — What sum would cover dam- 
age to destroyed property? 

A. — Assuming that all the 43,108 de- 
stroyed buildings in Belgium had been 
destroyed by the Germans, and assum- 
ing that each building was worth $10,000 
(which is a valuation wildly beyond the 
possible actual values, since most of the 
houses were small village houses), the 
total sum needed to pay for the destruc- 
tion would be $431,980,000. Three weeks' 
war-cost at_ $140,000,000 a week would 
pay even this high sum. If we estimate 
an average value of $2,000 a house (still 
fairly high, but approximately near ac- 
tual facts), we would have damages 
amounting to $86,396,000 — payable out 
of 4 l / 2 days' war-cost. 

Q. — What are the total Belgian 
losses? 

A. — There has been no official statement 
of total loss. In October, 1918, an official 
Belgian source presented an incomplete 
estimate of damages and losses, counting 
levies, contributions, etc., as amounting 
to not much under two billions of dollars. 

Q. — Has Belgium been used as a 
battlefield often? 

A. — Not since its neutralization. Be- 
fore that, every time there was war in 
western Europe, Belgium was a scene of 
either battles or army-movements. 

The French and British Wars, seven- 
teenth and eighteenth century, were 
largely fought on Belgian territory. 
Many of the famous European battles 
were around Belgian towns — the Battle 
of the Spurs (1302), Courtrai; Bruges 
(1745, 1794), occupied by French; Brus- 



156 



Questions and Answers 



sels, French, Spanish and Austrian wars ; 
Tournay, English and Freqch (1709) ; 
Louvain taken by French (1792, 1794) ; 
Liege taken by Marlborough (1702), by 
French (179?) ; Lierre taken by Marl- 
borough (1706) ; Namur bombarded by 
Allies against Napoleon (1804); Tirle- 
mont, Austrians and French (i793, ^794) J 
Roulers, Austrians and French (1794) '> 
Waterloo, defeat of Napoleon (1815). 

Q. — Was Antwerp fortified? 

A. — It was regarded as the strongest 
fortress in the world. Five years before 
the war it was decided to spend $20,000,- 
000 on remodeling the forts, and provid- 
ing new armaments. In addition to the 
great protecting forts, the town was en- 
circled by ramparts, and completely sur- 
rounded by wide channels of water. 
Powerful forts covered the Scheldt 
(which is also called the Escaut until it 
reaches the Dutch frontier). As we 
know, the forts, deemed impregnable, 
were battered to bits by the huge Ger- 
man howitzers, their own guns being of 
too short a range to reply. 

Q. — Was Antwerp the greatest sea- 
port in the whole world? 

A. — New York handled a couple of 

hundred thousand more tons in 1913, but 
for a long time Antwerp has been first. 

The recent immense growth in tonnage 
of the transatlantic liners has given New 

York her premier position. The figures 
are interesting: 

Entered. Cleared. 

New York 12,763,765 I3.549, T 38 

Antwerp 13,233,677 13,272,665 

Hamburg 11,830,949 11,946,239 

Hong Kong 11,138,527 11,142,117 

Rotterdam 10,624,499 10,609,814 

London 10,800,716 8,748,008 

Montevideo... 8,244,375 8,121,543 

Marseilles 8,051,321 8,198,874 

Singapore 7-737,785 7,717,691 

Cardiff 6,236,944 9,168,1 15 

Liverpool 7,253,016 7,446,873 

Colombo 7,074,152 7,073,170 

Rio de Janeiro.. 5,212,713 5,198,784 

Shanghai 4,183,528 4,155,152 

Q. — In ordinary times is Belgium 
self-supporting? 

A. — Not by a very large margin. In 
times of peace Belgium, like Great Brit- 
ain, was obliged to import large quanti- 
ties of foodstuffs, almost two-thirds, in 
fact, of the total consumption. It is ob- 
vious enough, therefore, that if the Bel- 



gians are to exist, large quantities of 
food must be sent them from outside. 

Q. — How many Belgian refugees 
were still in Holland in 191 7? 

A. — According to the last official re- 
port, January, 1917, less than eighteen 
thousand were then in Holland who were 
dependent on Dutch hospitality. An 
equal number were estimated to be there, 
also, who were paying their own ex- 
penses. During the German invasion it 
is said that a million refugees reached 
Holland from over the border, but many 
soon returned to Belgium, and many 
crossed to England. During 1915 Hol- 
land spent $3,500,000 for the maintenance 
of refugees. 

Q._Who was Edith Cavell? 

A. — She was an Englishwoman, direc- 
tress of a large nursing home at Brus- 
sels, Belgium. 

Q. — Why was she executed by the 
Germans ? 

A. — On Aug. 5, 191 5, she was arrested 
by the German authorities and confined 
in the prison at St. Gilles on the charge 
that she had aided stragglers from the 
Allied armies to escape across the fron- 
tier from Belgium to Holland, furnish- 
ing them with money, clothing and in- 
formation concerning the route to be fol- 
lowed. Her lawyer was not allowed to 
see her before the trial or to examine any 
of the prosecution's documents. 

Q. — Was it right to call her a spy? 

A. — No. She was tried on the charge 
of "aiding the hostile Power or causing 
harm to German or allied troops," which 
constitutes "treason" under the German 
Penal Code. 

Hugh Gibson, Secretary of our Lega- 
tion in Brussels, who made every effort 
open to him on Miss Cavell's behalf, 
pronounces the sentence a strained read- 
ing of the law: "A false interpretation 
was wilfully put upon these provisions in 
order to secure a conviction." 

She was not a spy, according to the 
German's own accusation ; only when the 
whole world signified its execration of 
the act did the German officials begin 
to refer to her as "the spy Cavell." She 
was a devoted, brave woman whose 
name will ever be cherished. 

The manner of her execution was in 
character with the whole proceeding 
against her. Mr. Gibson secured a defi- 
nite promise from Herr Conrad, of the 



Ravaged Belgium 



157 



Political Department, to inform her 
friends of the decision the moment the 
court should pass judgment. This was 
confirmed at 6:20 p. m. on October 12. 
Yet over an hour before the judges had 
actually pronounced sentence. 

In spite of all protests, Miss Cavell was 
shot before daybreak. 

The German military chaplain who 
stayed with her at the end declared : 

"She died like a heroine." 

Q. — Was any effort made by the 
American Legation to stay the 
execution of Miss Cavell? 

A. — Yes. As the American Legation 
was entrusted with the British interests 
in the occupied portions of Belgium, the 
American Minister and his staff tried 
their utmost to get the German authori- 
ties to agree to allow the legal counselor 
of the Legation to consult with Miss 
Cavell and, if desirable, entrust some- 
one with her defense. This was not al- 
lowed and, although frantic efforts were 
made to get the authorities to delay 
sentence, nothing could be accomplished. 

Q. — By how many men was Liege 
defended? 

A. — About 20,000 Belgian soldiers 
were in the fortification scheme of Liege, 
a territory of about thirty miles. 

Q. — How many men did Belgium 
have at the front during the in- 
vasion of her country? 

A. — Belgium had probably about one 
hundred thousand men at the front dur- 
ing the invasion. 

Q. — What was the Belgian relief 
movement? 

A. — After war Began in 1914 an organi- 
zation was created quickly under direction 
of Herbert C. Hoover, to relieve destitu- 
tion in the invaded country. It was fi- 
nanced by private contributions at first, 
and Americans supplied large sums. 
From June 1, 1917, the United States ad- 
vanced $12,500,000 a month to carry it 
on. Huge quantities of food and clothing 
were shipped in, the German occupying 
authorities having entered "into an agree- 
ment to abstain from interference or 
requisition. Up to April, 1018, the United 
States had sent 9^2 million bushels pota- 
toes, 52,000 tons flour, 14,000 tons corn, 
983 tons meat, 31,000 tons cheese, 2,700 
tons rice, 4,000 tons peas and beans, and 
122,000 tons clothing. 



Q. — What are The Hague Conven- 
tions ? 

A. — They are agreements reached be- 
tween nations regarding certain interna- 
tional matters. The great ones are: (1) 
A convention for the pacific settlement 
of international conflicts. (2) A conven- 
tion relative to the recovery of contrac- 
tual debts. (3) A convention relative to 
the opening of hostilities. (4) A con- 
vention concerning the laws and customs 
of war on land. (5) A convention con- 
cerning the rights and duties of neutral 
States and individuals in land warfare. 
(6) A convention regarding the treatment 
of the enemy's merchant ships at the out- 
break of hostilities. (7) A convention 
regarding the transformation of mer- 
chant ships into vessels of war. (8) A 
convention in regard to the placing of 
submarine mines. (9) A convention con- 
cerning the bombardment of undefended 
towns by naval forces. (10) A conven- 
tion for the adaptation of the principles 
of the Geneva convention to maritime 
warfare. (11) A convention imposing cer- 
tain restrictions upon the right of capture 
in maritime war. (12) A convention pro- 
viding for the establishment of an in- 
ternational prize court. (13) A conven- 
tion defining the rights and duties of 
neutral States in maritime war. 

Q. — Is The Hague Tribunal elected 
annually ? 

A. — The Hague Tribunal is a perma- 
nent court of arbitration at The Hague, 
and is "competent for all arbitrations, 
unless the parties agree to institute a 
special tribunal." Each signatory power 
selects four persons, at the most, whose 
tenure is six years, and whose appoint- 
ments are renewable. When it is de- 
sired to have recourse to arbitration 
under The Hague convention, a special 
tribunal is selected from this list. The 
members of the court enjoy diplomatic 
immunities. The United States was the 
first power to submit a case to The Hague 
court. This was the case of the "Pious 
Fund of the Californias" with Mexico. 

Q. — What is meant by the "scrap 
of paper"? 

A. — On August 4, 1914, the British Am- 
bassador in Berlin, Sir Edward Goschen, 
justified the entrance of England into the 
war chiefly on the ground that Germany 
had violated the neutrality of Belgium. 
In his dispatch to the British Govern- 
ment, he reported his conversation with 
the German Chancellor, von Bethmann- 



158 



Questions and Answers 



Hollweg, who said: "Just for a word— 
'neutrality,' a word which in war-time 
had so often been disregarded — just for 
a scrap of paper Great Britain was going 
to make war on a kindred nation." 

Q. — Was the "scrap of paper" story 
ever denied? 

A.— The Committee on Public Infor- 
mation (Washington) says : "When the 
dispatch was published by the British 
Government, the Associated Press cor- 
respondent obtained an interview with 
the German Chancellor, who said that 
Sir Edward Goschen had misunderstood 
what he had said about the scrap of paper. 
The Chancellor maintained that what he 
had said was that England entered the 
war to serve her interests ; and that 
among her motives the Belgian neutrality 
treaty 'had for her only the value of a 
scrap of paper.' " 

Q. — Did Germany intend to keep 
Belgium if possible? 



A. — Through the first four years of 
war, Germany's official spokesmen avoided 
any clear, specific binding declaration, 
and all that time powerful factions con- 
ducted propaganda that grew steadily in 
boldness and frankness, aiming to create 
throughout Germany a popular demand 
for Belgium's retention. The possession 
of Antwerp was urged particularly. 

Q. — Did official Germany finally 
pretend to declare itself? 

A. — Yes. On July 12, 1918, just before 
German troops started the offensive across 
the Marne which brought on the great 
French, American and British counter- 
offensive of July and August, Count von 
Hertling, the Imperial Chancellor, said in 
the course of a speech before the Reich- 
stag Main Committee : "The present pos- 
session of Belgium only means that we 



have a pawn for future negotiations. We 
have no intention to keep Belgium in any 
form whatever. What we precisely want 
is that after the war restored Belgium 
shall, as a self-dependent State, not be 
subject to anybody as a vassal and shall 
live with us in good friendly rela- 
tions. . . . What we want is inviolability 
of our territory, open air for the expan- 
sion of our people in the economic do- 
main, and naturally also security in re- 
gard to the future." 

Q. — Were any British soldiers in 
Belgium before the Germans? 

A. — It was not until August 14, 1914, 
that the first British troops reached the 
Continent. 

Q. — Did America by treaty pledge 
herself to the integrity of 
Luxembourg and Belgium? 

A. — The United States never guaran- 
teed Belgium or Luxembourg. She had 
nothing whatever to do with the Treaty 
of London, by which, in 1839, Great Brit- 
ain, France, Prussia, Russia, and Austria 
guaranteed the neutrality of Belgium. In 
no treaty that the United States ever 
signed has it in any way undertaken to 
guarantee the neutrality of any European 
State. It is often asserted, even now, that 
the United States was, in some way, re- 
sponsible by treaty for Belgium, but she 
had no more responsibility for that small 
kingdom than she has for Russia, France, 
Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia, or any other 
country in Europe. She was, it is true, 1 
signatory of The Hague Conventions, 
which, in general terms reaffirmed the in- 
violability of neutrals in war time, but in 
signing these she specifically declared that 
nothing in the Conventions should be 
binding on her if it involved a violation 
of the Monroe Doctrine, or would em- 
broil her in European conflagrations. 



I 



(See pages in end of volume for details of German Invasion and Occupation.) 



LITHUANIANS AND POLES 



Q. — Are the people of Courland, 
Livonia and Esthonia not 
Slavs? 

A. — They are not. They are of a very 
distinct racial stock known as Letts. The 
Lettish people claim that they are among 
the oldest races of Europe, and there is 
foundation for this assertion. Ethnology 
finds that distinct Lettish characteristics 
(language, folk-lore, physical traits, etc.) 
justify the supposition that the Lettish 
racial history goes back four or even five 
thousand years. 

Q. — What specious use did the 
Germans make of this? 

A. — The Pan-Germans use this to pre- 
tend in their arguments to show why the 
Baltic Sea provinces were not truly a part 
of Russia — with the deduction, as the Pan- 
Germans saw it, that, therefore, they 
might "naturally" be made a part of Ger- 
many. The Germans did once rule them 
— very long ago. 

Q. — Why should Germany desire 
the provinces? 

A. — Largely because they contain the 
very useful seaport of Riga. In addition, 
the coast-line extends to the eastern end 
of the Baltic, and thus would round out 
German possession of the whole Baltic 
coast. Beyond this, their hold would thus 
extend to the mouth of the Gulf of Fin- 
land, commanding the approach to Petro- 
grad. A very powerful class has a more 
specific and direct interest in the acqui- 
sition of these Baltic Sea Provinces. Ad- 
joining, as they do, the territory of the 
large land-holding aristocracy of East 
Prussia, they tempt to extension of these 
agricultural interests and offer field for 
German peasant colonization. 

Q. — Has Russia always owned the 
Baltic Sea territory? 

A. — No. Lithuania belonged to Poland 
once. Russia obtained it in the Polish 
dismemberments during the eighteenth 
century. 

Q. — Were the Baltic provinces ever 
independent? 

A. — Only in a very general sense. They 
formed one state, Livonia, but in one way 
or another it was always ruled or tribu- 
tary. 

In 1561 the state was finally broken up, 
part (now belonging to the Russian prov- 
ince of Vitebsk) being annexed to Poland, 



part (Livonia and Esthonia) being ap- 
propriated by Sweden, and part (Cour- 
land) being constituted as a duchy under 
the suzerainty of the King of Poland. 
Thus, though the population remained 
very independent ethnologically, and still 
is composed of Letts and Esthonians, 
races of Finno-Lithuanian origin, the rul- 
ers were always aliens, ending with the 
Russians. 

The Germans came to this region in the 
thirteenth century, first as colonists and 
then in the garb of "Brothers of the 
Sword" (a religious order created after 
the manner of the Teutonic Knights) 
as conquerors. 

One of the three main branches of the 
Lithuanian people, the Borussians, came 
completely under their domination and 
ceased to have any separate nationality, 
leaving only their name to the state of 
Prussia. 

Q. — Where were the sympathies 
of these provinces? 

A. — There were very strong commer- 
cial German interests, and also powerful 
official leanings towards Russia. But the 
body of the Lithuanian folk, including 
the Baltic provinces, has always been 
most tenacious of racial traditions. Their 
former pagan divinities, for instance, are 
continually mentioned in their songs and 
everyday speech. 

As might be expected from such a 
people the mass of them have no desire 
to be either Russian or German but 
cherish aspirations for political entity of 
their own — quite similar to those of the 
Checho-Slovaks or Jugo-Slavs. 

Q. — Was Poland ever a very large 
nation ? 

A. — At the beginning of the Reforma- 
tion in Europe (Luther's time, 1483-1536), 
the area of Poland was greater than that 
of Germany proper; that is, excluding 
the various Italian and Austrian portions 
of the Empire. The Poles were then, and 
remained for many generations, the most 
warlike nation in Europe in many senses, 
wonderfully brave, marvelously skilled in 
dashing warfare, particularly with cavalry, 
and extremely restless and fiery. 

At one time their rulership extended 
from the Baltic to the Black Sea. They 
held Livonia, Esthonia and Courland on 
the Baltic, and Galicia on the Hungarian 
border, with such cities as Lemberg. They 
conquered a large part of the Ukraine, 
threatening the Tartars of the Crimea. 

59 



i6o 



Questions and Answers 



Incessant wars with the Cossacks of the 
Black Sea and the Don and with the Tar- 
tars did much to sap their national 
strength. 

Q. — When was Poland broken up? 

A. — Its downfall may be said to have 
begun when the Swedes and Russians 
broke into it in 1564 and conquered it. Its 
final doom came when continual wars 
ended in the famous agreement between 
Catherine II of Russia, Frederick II of 
Prussia, and Maria Theresa of Austria to 
dismember the kingdom. 

From that time Poland became subject 
to successive partitions. Between 1772 
and 1795 it was thus divided and sub-di- 
vided, till Russia had what is now Russian 
Poland and Lithuania, Prussia had what 
is now West Prussia and Posen, and 
Austria had Galicia. 

In 1815, at the Congress of Vienna, 
there was a new partition by which Rus- 
sia got the greater part of Poland. The 
Poles have rebelled several times (twice 
in the last century, 1830 and 1863), but 
their efforts were unsuccessful. 

Q. — Was there a Duchy of War- 
saw? 

A. — Yes. After the eighteenth-century 
partitions, there still remained a "free 
Poland" — a small strip of land around 
Warsaw. With the fall of Napoleon and 
the Congress of Vienna, the freedom of 
the Duchy of Warsaw was guaranteed 
under the protection of Russia, but after 
the revolt of 1830, it was formally an- 
nexed and ruled from Petrograd. There 
have been many tumultuous days in War- 
saw since. The "loyalty" of Poland in 
time of war has always been in question, 
for the Poles have always declared that 
they will be content with nothing short 
of a constitutional government of their 
own. 

Q. — Did wars alone cause Poland's 
downfall ? 

A. — No. Its own inherent weaknesses 
were great factors. It was in the tyran- 
nical grip of an aristocracy, consisting of 
nobles and a turbulent gentry. The serfs 
were reduced to the lowest position of 
any in Europe. The Diet or Parliament, 
which elected the King, often refused to 
grant the revenues and armies necessary 
for the public defense. A peculiar privi- 
lege, known as the liberum veto, by which 
any measure could be defeated by a single 
objecting vote, brought the legislature, 
as well as the monarchy, to a state of im- 
potence. "The road to Warsaw" became 



a byword in Europe for "the road to na- 
tional ruin." 

Q. — What are the Ukrainians? 

A. — "Ukraine" means border-land. The 
Ukrainians are known as Little Rus- 
sians in Russia and as Ruthenians in Aus- 
tria and Hungary. There are about 34,- 
500,000, distributed as follows : southern 
Russia, 28,000,000; rest of European and 
Asiatic Russia, 2,000,000 ; Galicia, 3,500,- 
000 ; Hungary, 500,000 ; Bukowina, 400,- 
000. 

The Ukrainians have asserted their 
right to independent existence for cen- 
turies. They claim that they own the 
land from the Carpathians to the Cau- 
casus, extending well northward into 
Russia, including parts of Russian and 
Austrian Galicia and parts of what is 
known as Russian Poland. 

They assert that the first alienation of 
territory occurred when the Poles con- 
quered all western Russia from the Bal- 
tic to the Black Sea. Later, when the 
Poles were conquered in turn by the Rus- 
sians, the Ukrainians became subject to 
Russia, but they have never lost their 
racial sense. 

The country they claim is said to be 
the richest agricultural territory in the 
world. It contains the famous "black- 
earth belt" that stretches from the Car- 
pathians to the Urals. Kiev and Odessa 
are among the big cities that are in this 
claimed territory. 

Q. — Does the Ukrainian claim fall 
under the principle of self-de- 
termination ? 

A. — It does. But it is vastly compli- 
cated because of the political fissures be- 
tween the people themselves. Thus, the 
extreme Ukrainians claim that all Rus- 
sian Poland reaching to and beyond Brest- 
Litovsk is properly part of the Ukraine. 
But the Poles also claim this territory 
as distinctly part of their nationality. In 
the days of Poland's greatness, they con- 
quered part of the Ukraine, and Poles are 
now numerous in some parts. Many of 
these Polish Ukrainians are politically 
powerful, being land-holders and mer- 
chants. 

Q. — Who are the Cossacks? 

A. — Originally they were roving bands 
inhabiting what is now known as the 
Ukraine. Hunters and fishermen origi- 
nally, the encroaching Turks and Tar- 
tars compelled them to take to arms to 
protect themselves. Later, becoming 
stronger, they carried the war into their 



Lithuanians and Poles 



161 



enemies' country, and harried them, car- 
ried on, indeed, a war of extermination. 
Curiously enough, they borrowed their 
name from the lower ranks of Tartar 
soldiery called Kasaki, a word meaning 
freebooters. The success of their raids 
induced them to go further afield, and, 
in time, they became dangerous to the 
settled western lands they should have 
protected from Turkish inroads. 

Q. — Where did they come from 
originally ? 

A. — When Lublin and Lithuania were 
incorporated in Poland, in the sixteenth 
century, many serfs migrated from these 
provinces to escape the heavy taxes and 
the cruel rule of the Polish nobles. They 
settled along the Dnieper, and spread, in 
time, eastwards to the Don. On the 
former river they set up a sort of com- 
monwealth, nominally under Polish dom- 
ination. However, the relations between 
the Cossacks and the Poles were often 
strained, and finally religious differences 
led to open fighting. The Poles were, 
and are, Roman Catholics, and the Cos- 
sacks profess the Orthodox religion. 
This, at first, led to the loss of all the 
privileges the Cossacks had enjoyed. But, 
later, leagued with their old enemies, the 
Tartars, they defeated the Poles and es- 
tablished a brief independence. Finally 
they and their lands were incorporated in 
Muscovy, and they have been Russian 
ever since. 

Q. — Do the Cossacks have special 
privileges ? 

A. — They still enjoy some of the privi- 
leges which were granted them when the 
migration from Lithuania took place. In 
return for these they are bound to give 
military service to the State for twenty 
years. They are scattered in ten sepa- 
rate districts, the most notable lying 
along the Don, the home of the Don 
Cossacks, who have played so prominent 
a part in Russian affairs since the Revo- 
lution. The Cossacks live in loosely co- 
operative communities, which own land 
given by the government. The primary 
unit is the stahitza, or village, which holds 
the land as a commune. These village 
communities elect assemblymen, who di- 
rect communal cultivation, education, and 
the like. The villagers appoint a supreme 
elder, and judges, who settle all minor 
disputes. 

Q. — What kind of military service 
must they render? 

A. — Every man must serve as a soldier 
from 18 to 38. For the first three years 



he undergoes training, for the next twelve 
he is on active service, and for the last 
five he is in the reserve. In times of 
peace, actually only about a third are on 
active service, and two-thirds remain at 
home. When war breaks out, however, 
all join the army at once. Every Cossack 
must provide his own uniform, equipment 
and horse. The State gives the weapons. 

Q. — Are there many Cossacks? 

A. — Over three million (half women). 
They put between 300,000 and 400,000 
trained soldiers into the field. All of 
them live on the land. They lease their 
mines to outsiders, who also run most of 
the factories in their territories. 

Q. — Are all Cossacks cavalrymen? 

A. — Most of them are, only about 20,000 
infantry being supplied by them. It is 
a common practice to call all Russian 
mounted men Cossacks, but it is incor- 
rect. 

Q. — Was Finland always Russian? 

A. — Finland was a free country from 
its foundation (about eighth century) to 
1293, when Sweden conquered it. In 1809 
it was "united" to Russia, but it retained 
its Constitution and National Assembly 
until at a favorable moment, in 1899, 
Nicholas declared it wholly a part of the 
central government. Finland protested to 
the Great Powers that the act was a viola- 
tion of its rights, but received no aid. At 
the time of the Japanese war, a general 
strike by all the laborers forced the gov- 
ernment to grant demands for a constitu- 
tional assembly. After the crisis had 
passed, the assembly became a mere fig- 
urehead again. 

The Finns, not being Slavic but allies 
in racial stock to the Magyars (both of 
Asiatic origin), never were willing to re- 
main Russian. Soon after the Russian 
Revolution they proclaimed their inde- 
pendence, but the Russian Provincial 
government under Kerensky would not 
acknowledge it, holding that it was a mat- 
ter for the Russian National Assembly 
to decide. 

Q. — Was Finland's subjection due 
to Pan-Slavism? 

A. — The incorporation of Finland and 
Poland both were part of the general 
movement of "Russification" ; and an at- 
tempt to suppress racial differences and 
form one language, one church, and one 
government. In its wider aspect, it is 
called Pan-Slavism and includes the Slav 
races of the States in the Balkans. It first 



1 62 



Questions and Answers 



appeared violently on the accession of 
Alexander III to the! throne in 1881. 
The Russian Czar, like the former Popes 
of the Roman Catholic world, united in 
himself the rule of the Greek (Slav) Cath- 
olic Church and the temporal power over 
the vast areas of the Russian Empire. 

Q. — Does Germany compel the 
Poles in Poland to speak Ger- 
man? 

A. — It has been reported that she has 
done so, but the Germans have apparently 
tried to conciliate the Poles, and have 
promised them autonomy and control of 
their internal affairs. In pursuance of 
this policy no tribute appears to have 
been levied on any of the Polish towns 
captured. 

The Germans tried to make the Poles 
in the Polish provinces of Prussia speak 
German, and even went so far as to pun- 
ish school children who went on strike 
because they were compelled to learn 
their lessons in German. 

The Russians have also systematically 
tried to stamp out the Polish language. 

Q. — Are there many people in the 
Baltic provinces? 

A. — Esthonia has an area of 7,600 
square miles, with an estimated popula- 



tion of some half a million; Livonia, the 
largest of the three provinces, has an 
area of 17,500 square miles, with a popu- 
lation of close upon 2,000,000; and Cour- 
land has an area of nearly 10,500 square 
miles, with a population of about 800,- 
000. The population is divided into Esths 
or Esthonians, and Letts. There is a 
percentage of Germans. The remainder 
of the population in the three provinces 
is made up of fragments of Finns, Rus- 
sians, Jews, and Lithuanians. 

The farmers are, for the most part, 
proprietors of very small parcels of land, 
the inadequacy of which compels them to 
do additional work for the German land- 
owner as hired laborer or rent some ad- 
ditional land from him on the metayer 
system. 

Q. — To what race do the Galicians 
belong? 

A. — There are two distinct racial 
strains in Galicia, both Slavonic — the 
Poles and the Ruthenians. These peo- 
ple differ temperamentally, historically 
and in religion, the Poles being generally 
Roman Catholics, the Ruthenians Greek 
Catholics. In the world war the Polish 
Galicians, for the most part, are pro-Aus- 
trian, while the Ruthenian sympathies 
lean toward the Russians. 



CLAMORING NATIONALITIES 



Q. — What were President Wilson's 
peace principles affecting small 
nationalities ? 

A. — They were four clauses laid down 
by the President in a Message to Con- 
gress, delivered February n, 1918, and 
they expressed the following: 

1. Each part of the final settlement 
must be based upon the essential justice 
of that particular case, and upon such 
adjustments as are the most likely to 
bring a peace that will be permanent. 

2. Peoples and provinces are not to 
be bartered about from sovereignty to 
sovereignty, as if they were mere chattels 
and pawns in a game, even the great 
game, now forever discredited, of the bal- 
ance of power; but that, 

3. Every territorial settlement in- 
volved in this war must be made in the 
interest and for the benefit of the popu- 
lations concerned, and not as a part of 
any mere adjustment or compromise of 
claims among rival States ; and 

4. All well-defined national aspirations 
shall be accorded the utmost satisfaction 
that can be accorded them without in- 
troducing new or perpetuating old ele- 
ments of discord and antagonism that 
would be likely in time to break the 
peace of Europe, and, consequently, of the 
world. 

Q. — How many small republics 
have been declared in Russia? 

A. — Up to March, 1918, three had de- 
clared themselves, and had made their 
declarations good by taking definite steps 
toward organization and toward foreign 
recognition. From half a dozen to a 
dozen other movements had either begun 
or were struggling along. Of these, the 
most important were the separatist move- 
ments of the Cossacks of the Don, and 
of the trans-Caucasus and Siberian prov- 
inces. 

The three really important and decis- 
ive ones that played a big part in the 
settlement of peace terms, were the 
Ukraine, Finland and Lithuania. 

Q. — When were the Russian re- 
publics proclaimed? 

A. — The Ukrainian republic was pro- 
claimed by the Central Parliament 
(Rada) on Nov. 20, 1917, and was rec- 
ognized at the Brest-Litovsk peace ne- 



gotiations. The same important step was 
taken by Finland, which formally de- 
clared its independence as a republic on 
Dec. 5, 1917, and was recognized by Nor- 
way and Sweden. Lithuania formally 
declared its independence of Russia on 
Jan. 8, 1918. 

Q. — Did other nations recognize 
the new republics? 

A. — No. They remained non-commit- 
tal. In February, 1918, the Supreme Na- 
tional Council of Lithuania in Switzer- 
land presented to the representatives of 
all neutral and belligerent nations a reso- 
lution adopted by the Vilna State Coun- 
cil, proclaiming the re-establishment of 
the independent status of Lithuania, with 
Vilna as its capital, but there was no re- 
sponse up to the time of Russia's sign- 
ing of the peace treaty. 

Q. — Did Petrograd recognize the 
Ukraine republic? 

A. — No. Both the Kerensky and the 
Lenine-Trotzky revolutionary govern- 
ments refused to recognize an independ- 
ent Ukraine, an independent Finland, or 
independent Lithuanian States. They 
sent troops to Finland and the Ukraine. 
The Lenine-Trotzky Government ordered 
war on the Ukraine, and continued hos- 
tilities till they themselves signed a treaty 
of peace with the Central Powers and 
•therein bound themselves to recognize 
the new republics. 

Q. — -Why did the Bolsheviki op- 
pose the Ukrainians? 

A. — The Bolsheviki claimed that the 
party in the Ukraine that had proclaimed 
independence was a party composed of 
the bourgeois population ; and, as the Bol- 
sheviki plan for Russia was to make it 
a republic of the proletariat, an attempt 
by the bourgeois to assert independence 
was just as obnoxious to them (and 
quite logically so) as if the old aristoc- 
racy had attempted a counter-revolution 
in Russia. In fact, the "counter-revolu- 
tion" feared by the Bolsheviki is essen- 
tially a counter-revolution by the bour- 
geois. If the Russian question were a per- 
fectly clear-cut issue between aristocracy 
and common people, the situation would 
be very simple. We would then have 
seen much less of these apparently con- 
tradictory actions. 

63 



164 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What is the correct name of 
the Ukraine republic? 

A. — The new republic has called itself 
the Ukraine People's Republic. The re- 
public was first declared by the Rada, or 
national assembly, called by the Ukraine 
people. Subsequent to declaring them- 
selves an independent state, the Ukrain- 
ians proceeded to conduct separate peace 
negotiations with the Central Powers, 
after the Russian Bolsheviki Government 
had broken off the first Russian negotia- 
tions. Revolts against the Rada opened 
the way for occupation by German troops 
and by August, 1918, a virtual German 
military dictatorship was in force. 

Q. — How big is the Ukraine re- 
public ? 
A. — It is a very big country, indeed, 
but its exact area had not been officially 
outlined when the treaty of peace was 
made. It is known, however, that it was 
the hope of the Ukrainian Rada to take 
in all the Ukrainian races and sub-races, 
and that this hope, if realized, would ex- 
tend the new republic to the land of the 
Don Cossacks — as far east as the Cau- 
casus, almost. Northward, it was de- 
sired to go as far as Brest-Litovsk, and 
even beyond, but the Poles immediately 
raised such a clamor that it was decided 
to settle that part of the frontier later. 
With the exception of Bessarabia on the 
west and what remains to Russia^ of the 
Caucasus on the east, this republic quite 
cuts the rest of Russia from the Black 
Sea. 

Q. — When was the Ukraine peace 
treaty signed? 

A. — February, 1918, in the notorious 
Brest-Litovsk treaty with all the Central 
Powers. It provided for a peace without 
indemnities, and appointed a general west- 
ern boundary for such part of the new 
republic as did not border on _ Austria- 
Hungary. As the northern limit of the 
western boundary runs into territory 
claimed by Poland, it was decided to 
leave its exact settlement to a commis- 
sion. In Russia the peace was generally 
dubbed a food or bread-peace. 

Q. — What can the Ukraine give to 
Germany ? 

A. — Wheat, rye, barley, sugar (beet), 
meat of all kinds, iron, manganese, mer- 
cury, timber. 

The Ukraine is the granary of Europe, 
despite the very easy-going and anti- 
quated methods that obtain through a 
large part of its territory. Its output of 



wheat, rye and barley alone is one-third 
of that produced by all Russia. It has 
amounted in previous years to about 35 
million pounds. 

Q. — How soon could Germany 
draw wheat from the Ukraine? 

A. — Of course, the crops are available 
only when the time of harvest comes. 
But it is well known that big stores were 
held there when the war began. One of 
the big reasons for the desperate 
Dardanelles enterprise was to open the 
straits and thus free the wheat crop, 
which would have fed the Allies and paid 
part of Russia's debts. How much of this 
was left and what condition it was in, is 
not well known. But the German news- 
papers have complained bitterly of the 
disappointed hopes for large food-sup- 
plies from this source, and the peasants 
are reported to have refused to furnish 
grain. 

A more immediate help is the meat 
which the Ukraine can furnish. Before 
the war the immense plains supported 
about 30 million cattle. 

Q. — Where is the Lithuanian re- 
public ? 

A. — It extends from Baltic Russia 
southward, expanding in the south to ex- 
tend well into Russia. The area of the 
republic forms a sort of cushion around 
the north and east of Poland, separating 
it from what is left of Russia with a 
belt about 300 to 400 miles wide. It con- 
tains the four provinces of Kovno, Vilna, 
Minsk and Grodno. 

Q. — About how big is this new re- 
public ? 

A. — It contains about 82,000 square 
miles (about one-third larger than New 
England), and it has about 9 million pop- 
ulation (which is also about one-third 
more than New England). 

Q. — Does the Republic of Lithu- 
ania include the Baltic prov- 
inces ? 

A. — No. These were mentioned sepa- 
rately in the peace treaty between the 
Russians and the Central Powers. They 
were referred to as the States of Esthonia 
and Livonia. 

Q. — What did the peace treaty say 
about the Baltic Sea prov- 
inces? 

A. — There was a specific agreement as 
to the eastern boundaries of both Es- 
thonia and Livonia, and Russia agreed to 



Clamoring Nationalities 



165 



evacuate them, while they were to be oc- 
cupied by "a German police force until 
security is guaranteed by their own na- 
tional institutions." 

Q.— What is the State of Esthonia? 

A. — It is one of the Russian Baltic 
Sea provinces inhabited by Letts and Li- 
thuanians. These provinces run as fol- 
lows, from west to east: (1) Courland, 
adjoining Germany, and containing the 
ports Libau and Riga; (2) Livonia, tak- 
ing in the Gulf of Riga or part of it; (3) 
Esthonia, facing the Gulf of Finland, and 
extending toward Petrograd. 

Q. — Did the treaty of peace make 
new boundaries? 

A. — Apparently the treaty did not es- 
tablish any very radically changed boun- 
daries ; but, of course, the radical change 
was that the treaty did accept the prin- 
ciple that Livonia and Esthonia were to 
be separated from Russia. 

Q. — Was Courland not mentioned 
in the treaty? 

A. — No, Courland was not mentioned, 
but there has long been a custom of re- 
ferring to all three Baltic Sea Provinces 
under the general title "Livonia." 

Q. — What presumably is the size 
of the Baltic Sea territory? 

A. — The three Baltic Sea provinces — 
Courland, Livonia and Esthonia — thus 
separated from Russia, had, under the old 
subdivision in Russian Government ap- 
portionment, an area of 36,000 square 
miles — that is, they would compare about 
with Indiana in area. Their population 
is more dense than Indiana, being about 
3 million. 

Q. — Is the Dobrudja a Balkan 
State? 

A. — No. It is merely a geographical 
area. The racial character of its very 
small population plays no part in the 
contest over this territory. Its value is 
due to its position on the Black Sea, and 
because the great commercial river of 
Europe, the Danube, empties through the 
Dobrudja into the Black Sea in a vast 
system of spreading deltas. 

Q. — Just where is the Dobrudja? 

A. — It extends along the western part 
of the Black Sea, from the Bulgarian 
boundary northward to the mouths of 



the Danube. It is entirely coastal, and, 
in a straight line, its Black Sea coast 
measures about 200 miles. It thus rep- 
resented the entire Black Sea coast of 
Roumania. 

Q. — Who holds the Dobrudja now? 

A. — The Central Powers held it by con- 
quest until early in March, 1918, it hav- 
ing fallen into their hands when they de- 
feated and over-ran Roumania. In 
March, 1918, the Dobrudja passed to the 
Central Powers by cession, Roumania 
having signed a peace with them which 
gave them this territory as far as the 
Danube. That means all of it worth 
having. 

Q. — Did the Central Powers assert 
any right except conquest? 

A. — Yes. The pretense was based on 
the fact that Bulgaria once owned the 
southern part of the Dobrudja. In the 
second Balkan War Bulgaria lost this 
part to Roumania for whom it gave an 
opening to the Black Sea. 

Q. — Does loss of Dobrudja shut 
Roumania from the Black Sea? 

A. — Geographically, it shuts Roumania 
entirely off from the Black Sea, except 
for trifling access through part of Dob- 
rudja north of the Danube, which re- 
mains to her. The deltas of the Danube 
make all that territory swampy and diffi- 
cult. The terms of peace, however, pro- 
vide that "the Quadruple Alliance will 
provide and maintain a trade route for 
Roumania by way of Constanza to the 
Black Sea." The subsequent cession by 
Russia of Bessarabia gave Roumania di- 
rect access to the Black Sea north of the 
Danube and the Dobrudja. 

Q. — Where is Constanza? 

A. — It is the best and biggest port on 
the Dobrudja Black Sea coast, and is 
situated about in the middle of that coast 
line. A railroad connects it with the 
various important Roumanian places and 
cities. 

Q. — Does the Danube run through 
Roumania? 

A. — Yes. After the Danube leaves the 
Austria-Hungarian boundary, it runs for 
a great distance along the Roumanian and 
Bulgarian boundary (in fact, forming 
the boundary), and then it swings sharply 
north through Roumania, running along 
the western side of the Dobrudja terri- 



166 



Questions and Answers 



tory. It runs almost into Russia, but at 
the northern Roumanian territory it turns 
sharply eastward and empties in the 
Black Sea. 

Q. — Will Roumania have access to 
the mouth of the Danube? 

•A. — She can hardly be shut off from 
using it, though she may be limited in her 
enjoyment of it. Under the arrangement 
that was in force before the war, all that 
part of the Danube from the deltas to the 
Roumanian cities of Braila and Galatz 
was under an international commission 
(Great Britain, Austria-Hungary, France, 
Germany, Italy, Roumania, Russia and 
Turkey), which improved and maintained 
it. 

Q. — What altogether did Rouma- 
nia surrender by the peace 
treaty? 

A. — Besides the Dobrudja, Roumania 
agreed by the peace treaty of March, 
1918, to permit "frontier rectifications" 
•between -her boundary and that of Aus- 
tria-Hungary. More important were far- 
reaching economical privileges exacted by 
Germany, among .them practical monopoly 
of the great oil-fields. 

Q. — How much area did Roumania 
take from Bulgaria originally? 

A. — Almost 3,000 square miles, with a 
population of about 300,000, most of 
whom were Turkish. 

Q. — How much population has the 
whole Dobrudja? 

A. — This one of the four historic di- 
visions of Roumania contains about 381,- 
000 people altogether, with Roumanians 
greatly in the minority. The population 
is mostly Turkish, Bulgarian^ Tartar, 
Russian, and a fair sprinkling of German. 

Q. — Did Roumania sign another 
treaty of peace? 

A. — Yes-. A few days after signing a 
treaty with the Central Powers, Roumania 
made peace with Russia, promising to 
evacuate all the occupied parts of Bes- 
sarabia, and agreeing that an international 
commission was to "take up points of 
conflict between the two countries," which 
was construed to mean that there was to 
be a discussion of division of Bessa'rabian 
territory. 



Q. — What are the facts as to the 
French claim to Alsace-Lor- 
raine? 

A. — Volumes have been written on the 
tangled historical questions of these two 
provinces, whose territory has been dis- 
puted by rival claimants ever since Roman 
times. 

It would be impossible to summarize 
fairly the pros and cons, but several facts 
stand out sharply: 

(1) Whatever was the proportion of 
Teutonic origin of the population when 
France acquired the territory in the 17th 
Century, the statement in the last edition 
of the Encyclopaedia Britannica is un- 
doubtedly true : in- process of time the 
people "considered themselves French." 

(2) Their representatives in the Ger- 
man Reichstag, after the forcible annexa- 
tion of 1871, clearly voiced the popular 
•ideals in their protests against the sever- 
ance from France. 

(3) The feeling of the whole civilized 
world to-day, outside of the nations in- 
terested, unquestionably upholds Presi- 
dent Wilson's statement that it is a mere 
act of -strict international justice to repair 
this "wrong done France" by <the return 
of .these lost provinces. 

Q. — How did Sweden lose Fin- 
land? 

A. — As a result of many wars with Rus- 
sia. She was forced to cede the Grand 
Duchy of Finland to the Czar in 1809. 
Though Russia had promised to respect 
the free institutions of the Finns and to 
let them remain under their constitution, 
there soon began a series of reactionary 
changes till at last their constitution was 
boldly taken away, and they were re- 
duced to a mere subject .territory, greatly 
to their bitter indignation*, for the Finns 
have long been noted for love of freedom 
and country. 

Q. — Does Sweden not want Fin- 
land back? 

A. — Sweden has sorely felt the humilia- 
tion of losing Finland, and the treatment 
accorded to the Finns has not a little 
pained the Swedish people, and kept awake 
their hostility toward Russia. But Sweden 
always has realized keenly that she herself 
is quite powerless- against her big neigh- 
•bor, and her governments have tried 
zealously to keep the peace. 

Q. — What religion have the Finns? 

A. — Originally, they were pagans of 
Mongolian affiliations. The Swedes 
brought them Christianity. At the pres- 
ent time they are mostly Lutherans. 



Clamoring Nationalities 



167 



Q. — When did Russia agree to 
evacuate Finland? 

A. — On March 1, 1918, a treaty was 
signed in Petrograd. Russia agreed to 
turn over to Finland all claims to terri- 
tory and property "in the territory bor- 
dering on the Arctic Ocean," thus giv- 
ing Finland all the northern part of 
Russia adjoining Sweden and containing 
the ancient Lapland. 

Q. — Is Finland a rich commercial 
territory? 

A. — It may not be unusually rich, but 
it is very much un-exploited, and it con- 
tains most of the resources that a coun- 
try needs for income — forest, agricultural 
lands, minerals and water-powers. It is 
about one-quarter again as big as our 
middle Atlantic States. 

These resources have not been left un- 
utilized. Finland has a good system of 
canals, a reasonably good but very lim- 
ited system of railroads, a small but 
profitable industrial system, and some 
shipping. Behind Finland's life is a tra- 
ditional love for schools, and there is a 
very sound educational system, which 
would have been still better had the Finns 
been permitted to govern themselves. 

Q. — Who sold most to Finland? 

A. — Germany did. She led all competi- 
tors so far that had it not been for Rus- 
sian trade (which came next after Ger- 
many in volume), Germany would have 
supplied nearly all of Finland's needs, 
leaving only a few million dollars for 
the rest of the world. 

Q. — How many people are in Fin- 
land? 

A. — A little more than 3 million. The 
Finns are about 2*/> million. There are 
about 338,000 Swedes, 7,000 Russians, 2,- 
000 Germans, and less than 2,000 Lapps. 

Q. — Is Bessarabia Arabic? 

A. — The name is wholly misleading. It 
is entirely within European Russian ter- 
ritory. It was Roumanian till 1812, and 
of its 3 million population about 2 million 
are considered Roumanian. When the 
Ukraine declared its separation from Rus- 
sia, it fell to the Ukrainians, but actually 
they never had claimed it historically part 
of their territory. The Bessarabian As- 
sembly voted almost unanimously for 
union with Roumania and by treaty of 
May, 1918, the Roumanian-speaking part 
was ceded. 



Q. — Where is Bessarabia? 

A. — It is a province of about 17,000 
square miles, with about 3 million people, 
that adjoins the Russian frontier of 
Roumania, and runs down to the Black 
Sea. It has a very important coast line 
on that sea, and Odessa is on its eastern 
end where the river Dniester empties into 
the big sea. The fact that the large river 
runs through Bessarabian territory makes 
it commercially important. The city of 
Kishinev is in it. 

Q. — Why did we hear so much of 
Bessarabia? 

A. — Partly because through it lay the 
way to Odessa, and partly because its 
northern end wedges itself into a corner 
formed by Roumania and Austrian Buko- 
wina, and Galicia. The inhabitants of 
this debatable ground are so diverse in 
their politics and allegiances that the Aus- 
trians hoped to gain their support if they 
could break into Bessarabia. 

Q. — Is the Ukraine near Bessa- 
rabia? 

A. — The western end of the territory 
claimed by the Ukrainians adjoins Bes- 
sarabia. The Austrian operations toward 
Odessa were conducted through Bessara- 
bia. 

Q. — What is the size of Russian 
Poland? 

A. — Present Russian Poland is about 
43,000 square miles (almost as large as 
Pennsylvania), and it has 12 million popu- 
lation, which is 4 million more than Penn- 
sylvania has, despite its big and crowded 
manufacturing cities. 

Q. — Can you state the first Ger- 
man terms at Brest-Litovsk ? 

A. — The Germans agreed to withdraw 
their troops from all occupied Russian 
territory, except "portions of Lithuania, 
Courland, and portions of Esthonia and 
Livonia." For these territories it was 
proposed that a special commission should 
fix the details of evacuation "in conform- 
ity with the Russian idea of the necessary 
ratification by a plebiscite on broad lines 
and without any military pressure what- 
ever." 

The reason given by the Germans for 
making special conditions regarding these 
territories, was that the population had 
already, through representative bodies, 
proclaimed separation from Russia. 



1 68 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What really resulted from 
the Brest-Litovsk treaty? 

A. — Its aim, as revealed by later de- 
velopments, was clearly to deliver Russia 
over to German control — through indem- 
nities, through concealed or open mili- 
tary influence, and through exclusive 
agreements for German capital and in- 
dustry in Russian development. 

More than one far-seeing German has 
since pointed out that the Imperial Gov- 
ernment completely over-reached itself 
in this greedy and conscienceless pact 
with traitors to take advantage of the 
defenseless colossus to the east. As the 
terms of the treaty were gradually dis- 
closed, and the attitude and methods of 
the German commanders was brought 
home to the Russian people, their feeling 
of relief at the coming of peace turned 
to a resentment which manifested itself 
in sullen opposition and assassinations. 

Only a few months after the war, the 
much-acclaimed treaty was being fiercely 
condemned in Germany itself as having 
brought neither a real peace on the Eastern 
front, nor any likelihood of the commercial 
advantages which were to follow from it. 

From the point of view of morality 
it would be impossible to condemn this 
shameless compact too strongly. Its 
every provision betrays the ideal of 
"booty" — through treachery instead of 
open conquest. 

Q.— Will the Jewish question be 
dealt with in the Peace Con- 
ference? 

A. — A principle announced early in the 
war was "to assert and to enforce the in- 
dependence of free States, relatively small 
and weak, against the encroachments and 
the violence of the strong," and, as the 
struggle proceeded, this has been assumed 
to include the liberation of subject peo- 
ples. The Jews, however, are in different 
case from other races. The Czechs, the 
Poles, the Serbs, the Ruthenians, the Rou- 
manians, live in more or less definite 
areas, so that their creation into self- 
governing communities may be possible. 
The Jews, though, are scattered over the 
face of the earth ; they do not anywhere 
inhabit territory where they outnumber 
the peoples of other races in any extended 
area. There may be, however, a real ef- 
fort to procure just treatment for Jews 
everywhere, by laying down principles of 
just government for minorities every- 
where. 

Q. — Are there many Jews in Pales- 
tine? 

A. — Apparently there are not very many 



left there now, but before the war there 
were some 80,000. Of these, only 5,000 
settled in the country as a result of the 
Zionist movement. They were supported 
by contributions from abroad, chiefly 
from Russia. As funds were cut off as 
soon as the war broke out their condition 
was soon deplorable, and many escaped 
to Egypt. 

Q. — How many Jews are there in 
the world? 

A. — That is difficult to estimate, as not 
every country makes a religious census. 
There are probably about 13,000,000. 
More than 6,000,000 live in Russia, more 
than 2,000,000 in Austria-Hungary, and 
a few less in the United States. In Aus- 
tralasia there are 19,500; in Canada, 60,- 
000 -J in South Africa, 40,000 ; 250,000 in 
the British Isles. In Germany there are 
nearly 700,000 ; in Turkey, outside Pales- 
tine, 380,000; in Roumania, 250,000; in 
Holland, 1 10,000; and in Morocco about 
the same. France has 100,000, and Bel- 
gium 12,000. In Italy there are 55,000, 
and in Argentina more than 30,000. 

Q. — Who is spiritual head of the 
Armenian Church? 

A. — In the early days the headship was 
hereditary, and occasionally the "Cathol- 
icus" and the King were one and the same. 
Now, however, the Chief Catholicus is 
chosen by the Synod of bishops and 
monks, though, nominally, the choice is 
made by the Armenian people themselves. 
The seat of the Catholicus is at Echmiad- 
zin, the convent of Valarshapat, a town 
in Russian Armenia. _ There is a rival 
Catholicus, who has his see at Sic. 

Q. — What is the difference between 
the Syrian and Armenian 
churches ? 

A. — In earlier centuries both churches 
were alike, but long ago the Syrian 
Christians became members of the Greek 
Orthodox Church. 

Q. — What faith do the Armenians 
profess? 
A. — They are Christians. The Ar- 
menian Church is the oldest of all na- 
tional churches. Tradition credits the 
evangelization of Armenia to St. Bar- 
tholomew and St. Thaddeus. This leg- 
end probably was borrowed from Syria, 
for it is known that in the fourth cen- 
tury parts of the liturgy were read in 
Syriac throughout Armenia. During the 
early days of the Armenian Church it 
appears that many customs of the pre- 



Clamoring Nationalities 



169 



Christian priesthood were maintained, 
such as the sacrifice of animals under the 
rites of the old Levitical Law. 

Q. — Who are the Armenians? 

A. — No exact racial status is known. 
They appear to have been western non- 
Aryan Asiatics with strong mixture of 
Assyrian and Hebraic Semites till about 
600 B.C., when Persian and Parthian 
Aryan tribes conquered them. Later 
Mongols and Tartars came in. Through 
it all, both before and late into the Chris- 
tian era, Armenia maintained itself more 
or less successfully as an independent 
State. It became Christian at an early 
date and for many centuries was a bul- 
wark of Christianity. In modern times 
it became contested territory between 
Turkey and Russia after Persian control 
had weakened. The Armenian situation 
was further aggravated by the furious 
enmity (largely on religious grounds) 
between Armenians, Circassians and 
Kurds. The Congress of Berlin (1878) 
following the Russo-Turkish war par- 
titioned Armenia between Russia and 
Turkey. 

Q. — What were the Armenian 
atrocities? 

A. — In 1893 a revolutionary movement 
began in Turkish Armenia. After a year 
of disorders and desultory fighting, the 
Sultan sent regular troops and also called 
on all loyal subjects to suppress the re- 
volts. From spring, 1894, to summer, 
1896, massacre followed massacre, the 
victims being mainly Armenians belong- 
ing to the Gregorian branch of the 
Church, and the perpetrators being chiefly 
local Moslems aided by Kurds and Cir- 
cassians. It is estimated that from 25,- 
000 to 30,000 perished. Great Britain, 
Russia and France intervened, but with 
little effect, owing to diverging political 
aims. Armenian revolutionary societies 
continued their activity until the grant of 
the Turkish constitution in 1908, and mas- 
sacres were perpetrated to that time, no- 
tably the massacre of Mush (1904) and 
Van (1908). 

Q. — What massacres occurred dur- 
ing the present war? 

A. — In 1915 Turkish troops and Kurds 
fell on the Armenians in Asia Minor, 
charging conspiracy to aid the advancing 
Russians. The work was done in a man- 
ner and on a scale suggesting a plan to ex- 
terminate a population. Thousands were 
killed or deported, mainly to inhospitable 
spots where they died from starvation or 



exposure. Germany, as the ally of Tur- 
key, has been held largely responsible for 
not preventing the massacres. Some of 
her own citizens have seconded this 
charge. 

Q.— What is the Sinn Fein? 

A. — It is an Irish political group orig- 
inating in 1903. The name means "For 
Ourselves," or "For Ourselves Alone," in 
Gaelic, and the movement was originally 
a group of poets, philosophers and work- 
ers enthusiastic for the revival of the 
Gaelic language and literature, and Irish 
industries in Ireland. Later they became 
more revolutionary, advocating an Irish 
national bank, an Irish merchant marine, 
and Irish consular service — Irish auton- 
omy, in fact — and opposing Irish taxation 
by England, emigration, and recruiting 
for the British Army. This Sinn Fein 
party joined with Sir Roger Casement in 
the Irish Rebellion of 1916, and a Sinn 
Feiner poet, Padraic Pearce, was named 
as first president of the short-lived Irish 
Republic. Pearce, Thomas MacDonagh, 
Joseph Plunkett and other Sinn Fein lead- 
ers were executed as traitors in the Lon- 
don Tower in May, 1916, as was also Sir 
Roger Casement. 

Q. — How is the word pronounced? 

A. — It is pronounced "shin fane." 

Q. — What is the Home Rule ques- 
tion? 

A. — It is a demand by Ireland for its 
own separate political government, with 
its own Parliament sitting in Ireland. 
The government of Ireland has never 
satisfied the Irish. In protest against it, 
as well as against the conditions of life 
from which the Irish have suffered, there 
have been repeated political, educational, 
and revolutionary movements. The mod- 
ern history of the problem began about 
1880, with Charles Stewart Parnell as 
spokesm?'- for the Irish, demanding re- 
form of land tenure and home rule. 

William E. Gladstone was the first great 
British statesman to accept the idea of 
home rule, but no measure to accomplish 
it was passed until 1914, and this law 
was at once suspended for the duration 
of the war. A fundamental difficulty in 
adjusting a basis for home rule is the 
existence of two groups in Ireland, which 
have been mutually distrustful: (1) the 
Irish, who are mostly Catholic, and gen- 
erally live in the country; and (2) the 
Protestant Ulstermen, who are mostly of 
British blood, live in northern Ireland, 
own property, and direct the city life and 
manufactures. 



170 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What parties lead in Ireland? 

A. — (i) The Ulster Unionists in north- 
ern Ireland, who demand close connec- 
tions with England, and fear the control 
of Ireland by the Catholic Irish; (2) the 
Irish Nationalists, who comprise the bulk 
of the population, and have long main- 
tained a compact group of representa- 
tives in Parliament, desiring home rule, 
but more or less supporting the present 
war undei* the leadership of John Red- 
mond till his death in 1918; (3) a mid- 
dle group, drawing away from both of 
these and desiring a friendly accommo- 
dation of differences; (4) the Sinn Fein, 
extreme nationalists, demanding imme- 
diate and entire independence. 

Q. — Did the Austrians make peace 
with Montenegro or not? 

A. — They made a sort of arrangement, 
not with the king, but with two members 
of the Montenegrin Cabinet they found 
in Cettinje, General Becer and Major 
Lampar. By that time, however, many 
Montenegrins had fled into Albania, and 
those remaining were presumably not 
very hostile to the Austrians. The con- 
ditions imposed were that all arms had 
to be given up except those of the Mon- 
tenegrins who were to assist in the polic- 
ing of the country. The people were to 
lend all possible assistance to the Austro- 
Hungarian forces by furnishing them with 
food and water, means of transporta- 
tion and housing, but they were not to be 
required to enter the territory of their 
conquerors. The 3,000 Austrian soldiers 
who had been captured by the Montene- 
grins were released. 

Q. — Why did Greece stay out of 
the war so long? 

A. — It was the influence of the former 
King Constantine, whose wife, Queen 
Sophia, is a sister of the German Kaiser, 
which prevented the expression of the 
people's sympathy with the Entente. 

After Constantine's deposition, as a 
result of the Allied ultimatum in January, 
1917, documents and telegrams came to 
light showing that Queen Sophia was 
constantly urging her Imperial brother to 
send an army to their relief against those 
"infamous swine" the Allies ; that both 
rulers were in correspondence with the 
German military leaders, transmitting to 
them facts as to the Allied forces, plan- 
ning a sudden attack on Sarrail's army, 
plotting for the destruction of Greek 
artillery when they saw the case was 
hopeless. 

The various premiers who succeeded 



Venizelos were mere tools in these secret 
Hohenzollern intrigues. 

As the new Greek Minister to the 
United States expressed it in September, 
1917, it was the "assistance of the pro- 
tecting powers" which made the Hellenic 
people "free masters of their own des- 
tinies." 

Q_Why did the Balkan Allies 
fight among themselves? 

A. — The League of Balkan States had 
been inspired only by one common pur- 
pose — that of driving Turkey out of the 
Balkans. In everything else they were 
hostile. Serb hated Bulgar, and Bulgar 
hated Greek, and Greek did not much love 
either. When the extraordinary victory 
had come, and Turkey's whole Balkan 
possessions (especially Macedonia) lay in 
their hands, they immediately became fu- 
riously jealous of each other. Serbia re- 
fused to withdraw her troops from Cen- 
tral Macedonia, which the Serb-Bulgar 
pre-war treaty had marked out for Bul- 
garia. Bulgarians and Greeks raced head- 
long to seize desired portions of eastern 
Macedonia. The Greeks had already 
snatched Saloniki, and, while _ Bulgaria 
still was fighting the main Turkish Army 
at Adrianople, they took more cities and 
territory on the sea-coast of Macedonia 
near Saloniki. 

Q. — Who began the second Balkan 
War? 

A. — Bulgaria did. She began it, in- 
deed, without a formal declaration, and 
struck suddenly, according to the charges 
made against her by Greece and Serbia. 
But there had been sporadic fighting be- 
tween the various troops occupying con- 
tested points for some months. Bul- 
garia had, without doubt, done the big 
part of the fighting against Turkey. 
While Greece, Serbia and Montenegro 
had been defeating Turkish troops within 
the Balkans, and particularly within 
Macedonia, Bulgaria had held off the real 
Turkish Army, and had almost succeeded 
in striking at Constantinople. Flushed 
with her triumphs, and furious at the 
seizure of Macedonian territory, which 
she declared had been agreed should be 
hers, Bulgaria insisted on the pre-war 
pledges being made good instantly, and 
declared war as the alternative. To sum 
up : Whatever was the truth as to the 
conflicting claims, Bulgaria was as greedy 
then, as she showed herself later on, and 
was so "cocky" over her great prowess in 
war that she acted with insufferable ar- 
^gance toward her former Allies. 



Clamoring Nationalities 



171 



Q. — Who has the best claims to 
Macedonia? 

A. — The secret treaty between Serbia 
and Bulgaria certainly guaranteed Bul- 
garian possession of Central Macedonia. 
There is no doubt about that. It has 
never been denied. That Central Mace- 
donia is inhabited largely by Bulgarian 
peoples also is too well known historically 
to be seriously questioned. The whole 
history of revolts against Turkey through 
centuries has had, as one of its chief 
springs of action, the burning passion of 
the Bulgars to liberate brother Bulgars 
in Macedonia from Turkish rule. But 
no human being, however gifted, can 
draw lines on the Balkan map and say, 
"Here and here dwell such and such na- 
tionalities." The races are too intricately 
mixed — and they are not friends. 

Q. — Would a just settlement divide 
the Balkans over again? 

A. — If an international congress were 
to meet with the purest will to effect a 
"just settlement," and if it were to call 
in all the ethnological and other experts 
in the world, it would probably find it 
impossible to make a "just settlement" 
on the basis of dividing the contested Bal- 
kan territories among Greece, Serbia, and 
Bulgaria. Those three States might, con- 
ceivably, be satisfied ; but, in the divided 
territories, there would remain villages 
and districts wholly, bitterly unrecon- 
ciled. It might be possible (though ex- 
cessively difficult) to so arrange it that 
the unreconciled people would be only 
minorities — but it is the oppressed mi- 
norities that are making a good part of 
the big trouble just now over the ques- 
tion of "small nationalities." 

Q. — When did Greece begin to 
make herself felt in the con- 
flict? 

A. — Under the new regime the army, 
formerly controlled by the royal, pro- 
German intriguers, was reorganized and 
mobilized in its full strength ; and in 
September, 1918, the long-expected for- 
ward movement in Macedonia began. 
The Serbians swept forward irresist- 
ibly against the Bulgarian lines, accom- 
panied by French and Greek divisions ; 
and General d'Esperey, the commander- 
in-chief, wired the Hellenic Government 
that the Greek troops had covered them- 
selves with glory in this blow which 
shattered the Bulgar defenses. 

Meanwhile other Greek forces were 
attacking with the British in the difficult 
Lake Doiran region, where the fighting 



was most furious, and their enthusiasm 
and gallantry was a feature of the assault 
which impressed all the eye-witnesses. 

Q. — Was there a South African re- 
volt against England early in 
the war? 

A. — Yes. De Wet, the famous Boer 
leader, in October, 1914, raised the stand- 
ard of revolt with some five or six thou- 
sand Boers. By December 1, De Wet 
• was a prisoner, and his army dispersed 
and captured by Boer forces, led by De 
Smuts. Louis Botha, a Boer leader, was 
Prime Minister at the time, and main- 
tained the adherence of the Colony to 
the British Empire. 

Q. — How has Great Britain treated 
annexed nationalities? 

A.— In October, 1914, Field Marshal 
Earl Roberts made the following state- 
ment : 

"In India, which is, to some extent, 
under the control of the British Parlia- 
ment, such good work has been done for 
the development of the country, there is 
such security for life and property, such 
respect and toleration for the religious 
and social customs of the people, that 
impartial observers of all nations have 
united in a chorus of unstinted praise of 
British rule in India. Russian, French, 
and German writers who have been in 
India have, in turn, paid tribute to the 
sympathy, tolerance, prudence, and benev- 
olence of our rule. 

"Nor is there any sign that British ad- 
ministrators are tiring of their task, or 
likely to fail in bearing 'the white man's 
burden.' In each new dependency which 
comes under our care, young men, fresh 
from the public schools of Britain, come 
eagerly forward to carry on the high tra- 
ditions of Imperial Britain. We have 
only to look at the work done recently in 
Nigeria, in the Sudan, in Rhodesia, and 
in British East Africa, to see that as a 
race the British are, if anything, more 
capable than ever of carrying on the work 
of Empire." 

This view is surely confirmed by the 
records of Britain's colonies in this war. 

Q. — Does Great Britain possess all 
of India? 

A. — Practically, yes. Accurately speak- 
ing, no. As defined by Parliamentary 
enactments, the Indian Empire comprises 
all that part of the Indian peninsula di- 
rectly or indirectly under British rule or 
protection. This would leave out such 



172 



Questions and Answers 



territories as the big Himalayan kingdom 
Nepal (54,000 square miles), which has an 
independent ruler (Maharajadhiraja). 
However, there is a British resident and 
the whole vast peninsula is considered 
British in the popular sense. There still 
remain limited territories that do not be- 
long to the British Empire. Portugal 
owns Goa on the Malabar coast, Damao 
about 100 miles north of Bombay and a 
small island west of Damao (Diu), about 
1,600 square miles altogether. France still 
possesses Pondicherry, about 196 square 
miles. 

Q. — How did Great Britain obtain 
India? 
A. — Mainly through the operations of 
one of the most extraordinary commercial 
organizations that ever existed — the fam- 
ous British East India Company, which 
was the offspring of "The Governor and 
Company of Merchants of London Trad- 
ing into the East Indies," a corporation 
authorized in 1600 by Queen Elizabeth. 
It made the first commercial settlement 
in India in 1621, after having about 10 
years before defeated the Portuguese set- 
tlers who were there before them. The 
British East India Company, though 
technically only a private stock company 
of merchants, wielded many of the powers 
of a strong national government, even to 
the extent of maintaining an enlisted 
army, granting commissions and making 
war. 

Q. — Does the British East India 
Company still rule India? 

A. — No. In 1784 Parliament passed 
the first of many laws that gradually 
curbed and minimized its powers. After 
the great Indian Mutiny the entire ad- 
ministration of India passed to the Brit- 
ish crown (in 1858). 

Q. — What was India when the Brit- 
ish came in? 
A. — It was a country divided into in- 
numerable governments whose rulers 
were practically independent masters, 
though some acknowledged the suzerainty 
of a central ruler, the Grand Mogul in 
Delhi. Some of the rulers were Hindu, 
some were Moslem, other governments 
were mixed. Besides the Portuguese, the 
French were there before the British 
came in. The French and British fought 
from about 1700 to 1761, when the Brit- 
ish won a great final victory fthe famous 
Battle of Pondicherry), which reduced 
French occupation to a merely tolerated 
hold on a strip of seacoast. 

Q. — How is India ruled now? 
A. — By a "Governor-General and Vice- 



roy," appointed by the British Crown. He 
holds office for 5 years, and has supreme 
civil and military control with an execu- 
tive council of a somewhat indeterminate 
number of members, mostly appointed by 
the Crown or otherwise selected in such 
a way that the government shall always 
have a majority of at least three. 

Under this central government are the 
central departments ; and besides this 
great, widespread central administration 
are the very large and elaborate govern- 
ments of the 15 Provinces, each with a 
Governor and a Council or a "Resident." 
Under these again is the immense local 
machinery of government — the Districts 
within the Provinces. There are 267 of 
these District governments. The districts 
again are parcelled out into lesser units, 
under British officials, magistrates, or 
deputy collectors. 

Q. — What are the Native Princes? 

A. — They are the native (mostly hered- 
itary) rulers of the 700 native States 
which range in importance from areas 
containing merely a few villages, to such 
great domains as Hyderabad, which cov- 
ers 82,000 square miles and has more than 
13 millions population. 

Q. — Are the Native Princes inde- 
pendent? 

A. — Their powers vary widely. Almost 
each one is in special case by himself. 
All govern under political supervision of 
a British resident or agent. None of the 
Princes has the right to make war or 
peace, or to maintain any military force 
above a specified limit. No European may 
reside at any of the Courts without Brit- 
ish sanction. In case of misgovernment, 
the British Indian Government can exer- 
cise any desired degree of control. 

Q. — Are the Indian people Ar- 
yans? 

A. — Many are, but the population as a 
whole is composed of widely differing 
racial stocks, quite distinct from each 
other in blood and language. Ethnologists 
recognize four very clearly marked divi- 
sions : the 'Aryan or Sanskrit-speaking 
race ; the non-Aryan tribes or aborigines 
of the country; a very huge mixed popu- 
lation which has grown out of a fusion 
of the two previous elements ; and the 
Mohammedan invaders from the north- 
west. "These four elements, however," says 
the Encyclopaedia Britannica, "have be- 
come inextricably mixed together, some 
predominating in one portion of the coun- 
try, some in another, while all are found in 
every province and native state. The 



Clamoring Nationalities 



173 



chief modern divisions of the population, 
therefore, do not follow the lines of blood 
and language, but of religion and caste." 
The oldest known racial stocks are the 
wild tribes of Central India, known as 
Bhils and Gonds, who number over ten 
million. 

Q. — Do all the native opponents of 
British rule want independ- 
ence? 

A. — No. Their desires are wonderfully 
various. Some demand merely an appor- 
tionment of the better paid public offices 
among the natives ; others want simply 
social equality; and still others would be 
content with such reforms as a purely 
Indian fiscal system, etc. The more ar- 
dent ones demand a very large measure of 
genuine autonomy, and some want com- 
plete independence, and are willing even 
to resort to arms. These are a minority. 

Q. — Did Indian unrest prevent In- 
dian assistance in the war? 

A. — The amount of assistance from In- 
dia was astonishingly great. Besides very 
large voluntary money contributions from 
native rulers personally, there were heavy 
contributions of men and equipment. 
More than one and a quarter million 
troops were sent to fight for England on 
the various fronts. 

Q. — What were the India revolt 
plots ? 

A. — Almost as soon as the great war 
began natives of India in this country, 
who long had been protesting against 
British rule in India, began propaganda 
and engaged in activities which the great 
secret service system in this coun- 
try fought hard to prevent. The U. S. 
Government indicted about thirty men, 
among them several German consular of- 
ficials and others, the rest mostly East 
Indians, for "fomenting a revolution 
against a friendly power." They were 
put on trial in San Francisco and found 
guilty. 

A great deal of money was spent in the 
agitation, and it had ramifications in 
China, South America, the West Indies, 
Central America, and throughout Asia. 

Q. — Is India governed well on the 
whole ? 

A. — In "Modern and Contemporary Eu- 
ropean History," by J. Salwyn Schapiro, 
Associate Professor of History in the 
College of the City of New York, under 



editorship of James T. Shotwell, Pro- 
fessor of History in Columbia Univer- 
sity (published August, 1918), the verdict 
is : "Although heavily taxed and arbi- 
trarily governed, India has derived un- 
doubted benefits from British rule. It 
has brought internal peace to a land once 
distracted by tribal wars, established an 
enlightened civil and criminal code, and 
abolished barbarous practices, such as the 
suttee, or the self-immolation of a widow 
on the funeral pile of her husband." 

Q. — What are the causes of Indian 
famines? 

A. — They are given as shortage of rain- 
fall, with resulting droughts due to the 
lack of sufficiently extensive water-stor- 
age systems. This seems to be one of the 
very big reasons for periodical famines. 
Students and experts have often stated 
that in many famine years there had been 
a heavy rainfall, but it had occurred at 
the wrong time, and the water, of course, 
had gone to waste. 

Over-population is given as another 
reason. The critics of the government, 
however, point to the fact that popula- 
tion statistics, figured to the square mile 
of national areas, show that European 
countries have a denser population than 
India. The revolutionaries say that the 
true cause is the poverty of the people, 
which prevents them from having any re- 
serve for time of need. 

Q. — How does the government re- 
lieve famine? 

A. — Enormous irrigation works have 
been built and more are being created all 
the time as part of the British relief 
works. This work of the British in fam- 
ine relief has been praised by practically 
every observer, even by zealous critics of 
the British in other respects. Lajpat Rai, 
one of the most pronounced opponents of 
English rule in India, who has been exiled 
because of his agitations, says that this 
work of the English deserves ungrudging 
praise. They have reduced it to a science 
and a small army of splendid men give up 
their lives to it, and very often cut short 
their lives by their zealous labors. The 
system includes the undertaking of all 
sorts of great enterprises to provide 
wages, such as the building of railroads, 
dams and bridges, cutting of canals, open- 
ing of agricultural banks, etc. Relief 
camps are opened under alert officials and 
everything possible is done to bring food 
and means of earning it to the afflicted 
districts. 



174 



Questions and Ansivers 



Q. — Do famines in India occur 
often ? 

A. — William Digby, in "Prosperous 
British India," gives the following table, 
showing famines to 1900: 

Eleventh century, two famines, both 
local ; thirteenth century, , one famine 
around Delhi, local; fourteenth century, 
three famines, all local ; fifteenth century, 
two famines, both local ; sixteenth cen- 
tury, three famines, all local ; seventeenth 
century, three famines, area not defined ; 
the eighteenth century (1769-1800), four 
famines, Bengal, Madras, Bombay and 
southern India. 

Famines of the nineteenth century and 
loss of life thereby, divided into four pe- 
riods of 25 years : 

1800-1825, five famines, approximately 
1,000,000 deaths; 1826-1850, two famines, 
approximately 500,000 deaths; 1851-1875, 
six famines, recorded 5,000,000 deaths ; 
1876-1900, eighteen famines, estimated 
26,000,000 deaths. 



Q. — What salaries do Indian offi- 
cials get now? 

A. — The Viceroy of India (full title 
Viceroy and Governor-General) gets $83,- 
000 a year. There also is a list of large 
allowances for various purposes. The 
members of the Viceroy's Council get 
$16,000 each. The Governors of the 
Provinces get the following salaries : 
Madras, $39,000 ; Bengal, $39,000 ; Agra 
and Oudh, $33,000; Punjab, $33,000; Bur- 
ma, $33,000; Bihar and Orissa, $33,000; 
Central Provinces and Berar, $20,000; As- 
sam, $19,800; Northwest Frontier, $16,- 
000; Ajmer-Merwara, $16,000; Coorg, 
$16,000; Beluchistan, $16,000; Delhi, $12,- 
000; Andaman and Nicobar Islands, $12,- 
000. Total for heads of government (ex- 
clusive of Council members, of whom 
there are some 14), $420,800. 



Q. — Are many natives in the gov- 
ernment? 

A. — Practically all the high offices are 
held by Englishmen. Of the offices that 
have salaries down to $300 a year, most 
are held by natives. Thus the actual 
English governing class is very small, it 
being estimated that the important 
offices are held by less than 6,500 English, 
who succeed by a triumph of administra- 
tive machinery in ruling 300 millions 
native people. 

Q. — Have Constitutional Reforms 
been recommended for India? 

A. — During this war the Secretary of 
State for India (who with an appointive 
Council has the administration in Eng- 
land of the Indian Empire) visited In- 
dia, and as a result a report was made 
recommending far-reaching constitutional 
reforms. The important basis for them 
was an extension and development of 
Provincial and other local self-govern- 
ment. The chief recommendations were : 

(1) Completion of the edifice of local 
sel f -go vernment. 

(2) A considerable measure of respon- 
sibility in various fields to the Provincial 
Legislatures, which are to be mainly com- 
posed of directly elected representatives, 
with as wide a franchise as possible under 
Indian conditions. 

(3) The Viceregal Legislature to be 
dualized, the Second Chamber being called 
the Council of State. 

(4) Machinery for periodic inquiry 
whether further subjects can be trans- 
ferred to popular control. 

(5) Creating a select committee of the 
House of Commons on Indian affairs. 

(6) An inquiry into the constitution 
and operation of the Secretary of State's 
Council and the India Office. 

(7) Creation of an Indian Privy Coun- 
cil and a Council of Princes. 



RESTLESS RUSSIA 



Q. — What did the Russian peace 
treaty pretend to effect? 

• A. — It was signed at Brest-Litovsk in 
the first few days of March, 1918. A cer- 
tain territory "lying west of the line 
agreed on" was declared as no longer 
under Russian sovereignty. The line was 
not described in the treaty, but was un- 
derstood to be the demarcation for new 
Poland, Lithuania, and the Ukraine. 

The boundaries of the States of Es- 
thonia and Livonia were specifically ar- 
ranged. Russia undertook to make peace 
with the Ukraine People's Republic, and 
to recognize the peace treaty between the 
Ukraine and the Central Powers. Finland 
and the Aland Island were to be evacu- 
ated by Russia at once, and Persian and 
Afghanistan integrity and independence 
were to be respected by both sides. Rus- 
sia was to evacuate Asiatic Turkey occu- 
pied by her troops, and Erivan, Kars and 
Batoum (the oil and manganese regions) 
in the Caucasus. 



Q. — Could Germany get rich out of 
Russia alone? 

A. — If a coalition of all other nations 
obliged Germany to depend on Russia 
alone as an outlet for her commerce and 
industry, she would have a field which 
may be described as follows : European 
Russia (without counting Poland) is al- 
most exactly two-thirds of the area of the 
United States, and it has 30 million more 
people than we have. 

Yet this big territory, with its bigger 
population than ours, imports only one- 
quarter of what we import — and we are 
a great producing nation, manufacturing' 
heavily for our own consumption, while 
Russia needs goods from outside if she 
is to assume a big place in modern 
industry. 

Even at that low figure, however, the 
world's imports into Russia were about 
one-fifth the amount of Germany's entire 
annual export trade to the whole world 
before the war. 

It would appear that, with a free hand 
to industrialize Russia swiftly, expand 
railroads, etc., Germany might reasonably 
expect, in a very small number of years, 
to draw nearly as much wealth from her 
neighbor as she does now from the whole 
world. 



Q. — How much of Russia's total 
imports did Germany have? 

A. — Before the war she had about one- 
half of the total import business of Rus- 
sia. England came next, but very far be- 
hind. We came third, and a very bad 
third. Then came France and Austria- 
Hungary. 

Q. — What did Russia import most- 
ly? 

A. — Machinery and woolens from Ger- 
many, machinery and coal from England, 
and raw cotton from us. 

Q. — How much machinery did Rus- 
sia import? 

A. — About 85 million dollars' worth. 
Germany's whole exports of machinery 
are about 300 million dollars' worth nor- 
mally. Russia could possibly absorb all 
that if she were industrialized on a scale 
at all commensurate with her possibilities. 

Q. — Could the Central Powers and 
Russia exist by themselves? 

A. — There is one great staple of mod- 
ern commercial life which they could not 
produce within their own territories in 
sufficient amount, whatever else they 
might manage to do. They depend on the 
outer world for enough cotton. At pres- 
ent their only adequate supply comes from 
us and from Egypt, with some from 
India. 

The trans-Caucasus, Russian Central 
Asia and Turkey put together produce 
only about one-sixteenth of the produc- 
tion of our southern States. While the 
Turkish production seems to be increas- 
ing steadily, it is obvious that the supply 
would fall ever so far short of require- 
ments for many years to come. 

Q. — How do Russia's railroads 
compare with others? 

A. — Russia (counting European Russia 
alone) has 36,000 miles of railroad. To 
have as many, proportionately, as we have, 
she should have 176,000 miles. As it is, 
she has less railroads than Germany, 
though more than half a dozen Germanies 
could be. stuck away in Russia. 



175 



176 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Did Russia cede the Caucasus 
territories to Germany in the 
peace treaty? 

A. — The word "cession" was not used. 
Russia simply agreed to evacuate the "dis- 
tricts of Erivan, Kars and Batoum," and 
not to "interfere in the reorganization of 
the constitutional or international condi- 
tion of these districts, but leave it to the 
populations to carry out the reorganiza- 
tion in agreement with the neighboring 
States, particularly Turkey." 

Q. — Did this clause cover the whole 
Caucasus ? 

A. — No. It covered only that portion of 
the Caucasus immediately adjoining Tur- 
key on the eastern Black Sea coast. It 
is, indeed, a part that was Turkish until 
Russian conquest of the Caucasus made 
it Russian. Geographically, it is small, 
being only 20,000 square miles (about half 
the size of New York State), whereas 
that whole region of the trans-Caucasus 
(the formerly Turkish Caucasus south of 
the Caucasus Mountains) is 95,000 square 
miles. But in wealth it is of tremendous 
importance. 

Q. — Is Batoum the richest oil-field 
in Russia? 

A. — No. Batoum is the pipe-line termi- 
nus and the shipping port for some of the 
richest oil-fields in the world, but the 
trans-Caucasus province that is the big 
oil-producer is on the other side of the 
Caucasian peninsula — the province of 
Baku on the Caspian Sea, which nomi- 
nally remained to Russia. 

The oil-fields in the region generally 
are, however, quite rich enough to be a 
tempting and valuable prize. But there 
is another still greater value to the Ger- 
mans in control of Batoum and Kars. 
Batoum and a neighboring city named 
Poti are the seaport points for what prob- 
ably are the richest manganese deposits in 
the world. This district produced almost 
one-third of all the manganese obtained 
in 1913. What this means to Germany's 
iron and steel industry is clear. 

Q. — Has the Batoum region coal 
and minerals? 

A. — It has copper and coal. It is said 
that one mine alone, very inadequately 
worked now, has been examined by ex- 
perts who estimate that it has deposits of 
probably 1% million tons of ore that runs 
about twice as rich as American ore does. 
There also is asphalt and rock salt in the 
region. 



Q. — Is Russia overwhelmingly im- 
portant to the world's oil sup- 
ply? 

A. — In 1900 Russia produced thirty-one 
per cent of the oil of the world, but 
owing to the slackening of the Baku out- 
put, this percentage, of course, has de- 
creased heavily. The true wealth of the 
Russian oil-supplies has hardly been 
touched, it is said. 

Q. — Are the Russian peasants very 
poor? 

A. — There are large districts where, it 
is said, the average annual expenditure of 
a peasant on all his needs is not more 
than 20 roubles ($10) a year ! Even 
this tiny sum cannot all be spent on him- 
self. He must buy implements out of it, 
make repairs, etc., — if he can. In one 
district of 28,000 of these small peasant 
farms, io.oco do not own a single horse 
between them, and the 10,000 farms to- 
gether do not own fifty modern agricul- 
tural machines. 

Q. — Was there a Russian republic 
once? 

A. — In the city of Novgorod, south 
from Petrograd, is a monument erected 
in 1862 to commemorate the 1,000th anni- 
versary of the founding of that city. In- 
cidentally, it commemorates a Russian re- 
public which held its own for many cen- 
turies. 

The people of Novgorod (who probably 
descended from Danish sea-rovers under 
Rurik) obtained a charter from their 
Prince, Yaroslav, and after about a cen- 
tury of this semi-free existence, they 
elected their own Princes through a popu- 
lar assembly or council called the vyache. 
The vyache soon became the real ruler, 
and thrust the Princes out whenever they 
failed to please. In 1120 they decided to 
do without Princes altogether, and after 
that were governed by their vyache. By 
the fourteenth century the community 
(which consisted mostly of powerful 
merchants) had become so great that it 
included other large towns, such as Pskov. 
They forjht Swedes and Germans suc- 
cessfully, and, with the help of the Lithu- 
anians, beat back the invasion of the 
Princes of Moscow several times. In 
about 1475, however, they were overcome 
and Ivan III of Moscow took away their 
charter. In 1570 Ivan IV (Ivan the Ter- 
rible) subjugated them entirely, massa- 
cring 15,000 or, as some accounts have it, 
60,000. 



Restless Russia 



177 



Q. — What did the Russian Revo- 
lutionists want? 

A: — After the abdication of the Czar, 
the Provisional Revolutionary Govern- 
ment announced the following principles : 
(1) Amnesty for all political and relig- 
ious offenses; (2) freedom of speech, 
press, association, labor, right to strike, 
and extension of these liberties to troops 
so far as conditions permit; (3) abolition 
of all social, religious and national re- 
strictions ; (4) summoning of a constit- 
uent assembly; (5) substitution for the 
police of a national militia with elective 
heads ; (6) communal election with uni- 
versal suffrage ; (7) troops that partici- 
pated in revolution not to be disarmed, 
but not to leave Petrograd ; (8) severe 
military discipline in active service, but 
all restrictions on soldiers in enjoyment 
of social rights granted to other citizens 
to be abolished. 

Q. — Who formed the first Russian 
Provisional Government? 

A. — Prime Minister and Minister of the 
Interior, Prince George Lvoff ; Minister 
of Foreign Affairs, Paul Miliukoff ; Min- 
insters of War and Marine, Alexander 
Guchkoff; Minister of Finance, Michael 
Tereshchenko ; Minister of Justice, Alex- 
ander Kerensky; Procurator of the Holy 
Synod, Vladimir Lvoff. 

Q. — Was the Provisional Govern- 
ment recognized by the Allies? 

A. — It was recognized quite promptly 
by all the Allies, by most of the neutral 
nations, and by the United States, which 
was not then at war with Germany, but 
was fast moving toward it. 

Q. — Who are the Bolsheviki? 

A. — They are Russian Socialist Demo- 
crats. They are not a new party, but, on 
the contrary, one of the older political 
factions of Russia. The men who now 
call themselves Bolsheviki were originally 
the very radical element of the Russian 
Socialist Democratic party, representing, 
in a broad way, the political principle that 
the proletariat must rule, and that the 
fight of the proletariat is not merely 
against an autocratic government, but 
that it is also against the middle class — 
the class that, wishing to cling to its own 
possessions, even though these might be 
meager, must necessarily always oppose 
the proletariat's demand for communal 
ownership. 



Q. — Why are they called Bolshe- 
viki? 

A. — In 1905 there was a great split in 
the party, and the Radicals, then under 
the leadership of Nikolai Lenine, found 
themselves in the majority. They de- 
manded an immediate effort to secure a 
maximum of the party's program, and 
were, therefore, christened "Bolsheviki" — 
the men who want more — or Maximalists. 
Their more moderate opponents became 
known as "Mensheviki" — those who de- 
mand less — or Minimalists. The name 
seems to have had nothing to do with the 
fact that these "root-and-branch" parti- 
sans controlled a majority of the Social- 
ist Democratic party. They might be in 
a minority there, and among the Russian 
people as a whole, yet still be Bolsheviki. 

The present Bolsheviki party is com- 
posed not only of the original faction, but 
also of the radical faction of the Peas- 
ants' Social Revolutionary party, which 
joined the Bolsheviki in 1917. 

Q. — Were the Bolsheviki backed by 
the people generally? 

A. — They showed quite surprising pop- 
ular strength for a considerable time. 
At the third All-Russian Conference of 
Councils of Workmen's and Soldiers' and 
Peasants' Delegates, which was held in 
Petrograd during the end of January, 
1918, the opposition to Bolsheviki rule 
was so weak, both in numbers and in 
spirit, that it was almost negligible. This 
was unexpected, since this conference 
was attended by men who, under the 
Soviet or Local Council systems of Rus- 
sia, might be supposed to represent the 
people very directly, and it had been be- 
lieved that they would have marked dif- 
ferences of opinion with the radical Pet- 
rograd Socialists. 

Q. — Did the Soviets support the 
Bolsheviki peace with Ger- 
many? 
A. — The All-Russian Congress of So- 
viets, assembled in Moscow to act on the 
peace treaty submitted by Lenine, con- 
sisted of 1,164 delegates, soldiers, sailors 
and peasants being in the majority. The 
assembly voted overwhelmingly to accept 
the treaty, though voicing its unrelenting 
enmity toward the German military and 
capitalistic government. 

Q. — What is Lenine's political 
creed? 

A. — Nikolai Lenine's creed apparently 
remains the one he has preached all his 



i 7 8 



Questions and Answers 



life — the Proletarian Revolution. This is 
unlike the socialism of the men under 
Kerensky, who fought for a general so- 
cialism. The Lenine school holds that 
the class struggle must be fought out first, 
and that the undermost class is the more 
numerous, and must, therefore, be placed 
on top. In following out this idea to 
practical issues, he holds that the land 
question is the foundation of all poverty 
in Russia and that, therefore, it must b^ 
solved first. The solution, as he sees it, 
is to proceed to immediate and complete 
appropriation of all privately owned land. 

Q. — How much privately owned 
land is there in Russia? 

A. — Lenine said recently that of 207,000- 
000 acres in the hands of private proprie- 
tors, 21,000,000 acres alone were owned 
by a so-called "Department of Appan- 
ages," really a little group of Romanoff 
Grand Dukes. One such family, he said, 
owns more land than is possessed by half 
a million average peasant families. He 
enumerates 924 rich families in Russia 
which hold 27,000 acres each. 

Q. — Is not much land owned by- 
peasants? 

A. — One of the declarations of the Bol- 
sheviki political principles is that there 
are about several million of men of the 
peasant class, known as Zazhtochnii (rich 
peasants), who gamble in land, hold it 
for debt, etc., and starve the poor peas- 
ants. These oppressive bourgeois peas- 
ants were under the Bolsheviki ban like 
the great land-owners. 

Q. — Is Russia a true Slav State? 

A. — A majority of the population is 
Slav, but Russia is by no means a com- 
pletely Slav State. The race mixture is 
as remarkable as that in Austria-Hungary. 
Of the 132,000,000 population of Euro- 
pean Russia in 1915, 92,000,000 were Slavs, 
12,000,000 were Asiatic Tartars, 5,500,000 
were Finns (akin to the Magyars of Hun- 
gary), 5,000,000 were Jews, 3,000,000 were 
of Latin and Germanic stock, and 3,000,- 
000 Lithuanians. 

Q. — What races inhabit Russia? 

A. — Slavs, Lithuanians, Letts, Semites 
(Jews), Poles, Greeks, Swedes, Rouman- 
ians, Armenians, Persians, Kurds, Gypsies, 
Esthonians, Finns, Lapps, Samoyedes, 
Tartars, Bashkirs, Turks, Kirghiz, Uz- 
begs, Yakuts, Kalmucks, Georgians, Cir- 
cassians, and Caucasians (natives of the 
Caucasus). 



Q. — What was Russia originally? 

A. — Originally, the huge territory in 
eastern Europe now covered by Russia, 
was divided among separate tribes and 
nationalities, which had nothing in com- 
mon. Thus, at the death of Charlemagne 
(814 A.D.), when the empires of western 
Europe had attained splendor and a de- 
cidedly high civilization, the Russian ter- 
ritory was practically without any con- 
nection or communication with that west- 
ern civilization. The Baltic coast was 
held by a Lettish race, who formed a state 
there called Esthonia. The west and cen- 
ter of the area was known as Slavonia, 
and the greater part of the Black Sea 
coast, and the land reaching well toward 
the north of Russia on the Asian bound- 
ary, was held by the very powerful King- 
dom of the Khazars, who were Tartars. 

Q. — What is the Russian Holy 
Synod? 

A. — It is the supreme organ of gov- 
ernment of the orthodox church in Rus- 
sia. It was established in 1721, and, dur- 
ing the Czardom, was presided over by a 
lay procurator representing the Czar. The 
other members of the Holy Synod were 
the three "Metropolitans" of Moscow, St. 
Petersburg and Kiev, the Archbishop of 
Georgia, and a number of bishops sitting 
in rotation. 

Q. — Are all Russians members of 
the Greek Catholic Church? 

A. — In 1905 an estimate was made that 
of 140,000,000 Christians of various sects, 
about 87,000,000 were members of the or- 
thodox or Russian State Church. 

Q. — What are the other chief re- 
ligions in Russia? 

A. — Of the population (estimated at 
from 160 to 180 millions) living in all 
the Russian Empire, an area about 2^4 
times as big as the United States, about 
fifteen million are Mohammedans, Bud- 
dhists, or other non-Christians, about five 
million are of Jewish faith, and one hun- 
dred and forty million are of the various 
sects of the Christian religion. 

Q. — What does "bourgeois" mean? 

A. — The word means literally "bur- 
gher," or the burgher class — that is, the 
prosperous middle class of Europe. It 
became a term of opprobrium during the 
French Revolution, when the middle 
classes, which themselves had suffered 
under the tyrannical rule of the monarch- 



Restless Russia 



179 



ical aristocracy, became frightened by the 
excesses of the lower classes, and in their 
desire for orderly government leaned to- 
ward restoration of the monarchy — or 
were suspected of doing so. 

Q. — What do the Russians mean 
by "bourgeois"? 

A. — In Russia the term is now applied 
to everybody whose interests and leanings 
differ from those of the masses. All such 
persons are accused of capitalistic sym- 
pathies, and are under suspicion by the 
radical groups. The effect is to class 
among the bourgeois many so-called in- 
tellectuals and more moderate liberals, to 
whom, as a matter of fact, the first suc- 
cess of the revolution largely was due. 
It was because of his alignment with this 
class that Professor Milyukoff lost stand- 
ing with the radical revolutionaries. 

Q. — Would not the bourgeois be 
likely to cling to republican- 
ism? 

A. — The Bolsheviki fear and believe 
that the "bourgeois" element of the en- 
tire world (and perhaps Russia in par- 
ticular, because Russian political ambition 
is extraordinarily small among the mid- 
dle class) would be guided mainly by the 
class-desire for an "orderly" government 
beyond everything else. Business, trade, 
money-earning, money-making — these are 
wholly natural (and not in themselves 
blameable) purposes of the great middle 
classes of the world. Radical reform- 
ers, who profess themselves willing to 
suffer privations, or die for their beliefs, 
declare that the bourgeois would not be 
willing to suffer for a great ideal reform, 
but would weaken and turn to any power- 
ful party that might assure them of quiet 
and peace. 

Q. — Are there separate govern- 
ments in Russia? 

A. — Yes, and there always have been, 
though most of them were simply little 
autocracies, ruled by governors who rep- 
resented Petrograd. There are 78 of 
these local government divisions, and 50 
of them are in Russia proper. The local 
affairs (parish affairs) are in the hands 
of peasants' committees. Under the revo- 
lutionary government there were about 
17,000 of these parishes or cantons. 

Q. — What is meant by zemstvos? 

A. — They are an old form of assemblies 
elected for each district. A Russian dis- 
trict corresponds in a general way to a 



county. Zemstvos were elected by a re- 
stricted vote, and were purely deliberative 
local bodies with closely circumscribed 
rights and duties. Their importance and 
efficiency differed greatly in various parts 
of the country, but, as a whole, they did 
good work. Undoubtedly they spread the 
popular desire^ for self-government, and 
afforded practical experience of it. 

Q. — Did the zemstvos meet during 
the war? 

- A. — Prince George Lvoff, first premier 
of the provisional government, later de- 
nounced and dismissed, was a strong be- 
liever and supporter of the zemstvos. It 
was due primarily to his efforts that a 
voluntary council of all zemstvos was 
formed under his leadership during the 
darkest period of Russia's defeats by the 
armies of the Central Powers. This vol- 
untary body was chiefly responsible for 
the improved supply of food, munitions, 
and medical aid to the forces at the front 
when the incompetency and corruption of 
the established government were discov- 
ered. 

The fiftieth anniversary of the zems- 
tvos was in the year before the great war 
began (1913). 

Q. — Did the zemstvos rule cities 
also? 

A. — No. They are local elective assem- 
blies for the population dwelling outside 
the towns. Established in 1864, they were 
of two sorts — cantonal, in which even 
peasants had a limited representation, and 
Provincial, composed of delegates elected 
from the cantonal zemstvos ; they were 
to meet annually, and exercise large pow- 
ers in relation to education, public health, 
roads, etc. In 1890 their powers were 
greatly restricted, but in 1905 they re- 
gained much of the initiative which they 
had lost. The role of the congress of 
zemstvos, composed of leading members 
of the local bodies, who in November, 
1904, and June, 1905, assembled at Petro- 
grad, has often been compared to that jf 
the Assembly of Notables in the French 
Revolution. 

Q.— What is the Duma? 

A. — A Russian Parliament or Congress 
created under the old regime. It was an 
elective body representing the people at 
large, and was created August 6, 1905, as 
a result of a popular uprising. In Octo- 
ber, 1905, it received guarantees of free- 
dom of speech, conscience, assembly, and 
association, and of inviolability of the per- 



i8o 



Questions and Anszvers 



son. These guarantees, however, were 
not kept by the Government. 

At the same time the body then known 
as the Council of the Empire was made 
a legislative council and became the upper 
house of Russia's Parliament. 

Q. — What was the term of a 
Duma? 

A. — Constitutionally, the members of 
the Duma were elected for a term of five 
years. The first and second Dumas, how- 
ever, lasted only a few weeks each. The 
third Duma completed its term. The 
fourth Duma, elected in November, 1912, 
was in session at the outbreak of the revo- 
lution, and, though not actually a prime 
factor in its inception, was sympathetic 
toward it, and was a means through which 
anarchy was avoided. 

Q. — How were Duma members 
elected? 

A. — By a process which is, perhaps, the 
most complicated in the world. The origi- 
nal manifesto that brought the Duma into 
being was altered by Imperial ukase in 
1907, it having been found that under the 
original arrangement the Cadet party — 
the Constitutional Democrats, which in- 
cluded the Socialists and exiles returned 
to Russia when the constitution was 
promised in 1905 — was in overwhelming 
strength. The Cadets were so obnoxious 
to the government that the first Duma 
was dissolved at once. When the Cadets 
proved again to be in great majority in 
the second, it was resolved to alter the 
electoral law, so that representation 
should be more conservative. The mem- 
bers from Siberia, the Caucasus and Po- 
land were reduced from 89 to 39, the 
Central Asian Steppes were disfranchised 
altogether (they had before this sent 23 
members), and the number of representa- 
tives in all was reduced from 524 to 442. 
The members were to be elected by a 
complicated system of electoral colleges 
which cou'.d be, and were, so manipulated 
as to leave the power in the hands of the 
bureaucracy and landed proprietors. 

Q. — Had the Duma much power? 

A. — According to the constitution it 
had very little. It was allowed to have 
nothing to do with the army or navy. 
Legislation was in the hands of Minis- 
ters, who were responsible not to the 
Duma, but to the Czar. Members might 
originate legislation, but not until it had 
the approval of the Minister of the De- 
partment concerned. If, by a two-thirds 



majority, the Duma arraigned the action 
of a Minister, the President of the Im- 
perial Council laid the case before the 
Czar, who decided the matter. The Duma 
had little real power over finance, more 
than half the annual expenditure of the 
country in times of peace being entirely 
outside the control of Parliament. Min- 
isters could and did impose taxation with- 
out consulting the Duma at all, for when 
it was not sitting the Czar had the power 
to issue ordinances having the force of 
law. He had also the power of dissolving 
the Duma or proroguing it whenever he 
liked. Despite this, the Duma, during its 
last three or four years, established its 
position so well that it was beginning to 
take a larger share in public affairs, and 
began to brook no curbing. The Council 
of Soldiers' and Workers' representatives 
assumed superior power soon after the 
revolution. 

Q. — Were workmen represented in 
the Duma? 

A. — They were specially treated. Every 
industrial concern employing fifty work- 
ers or more, elected one or more dele- 
gates to the electoral college of the par- 
ticular government in which it was situ- 
ated. If it were not for the provision 
that at least one Duma member must be 
chosen in each government from each of 
the five classes represented in the college, 
it is obvious that the progressive elements 
would not have had any representation at 
all in the Russian Parliament. 

This rule, however, made it imperative 
that a fixed minimum of peasant members 
must be sent to the Duma, a fixed mini- 
mum of landed proprietors, and so on. 
But the Radical elements in the Duma 
practically all came from the cities of 
Petrograd, Moscow, Kiev, Odessa, Riga, 
Warsaw and Lodz. These seven cities 
elected their representatives for the Duma 
direct, although even in their case spe- 
cial precautions were taken to give the 
advantage to the wealthy electors. 

Q. — What was the Council of the 
Empire ? 

A. — There was of old an Upper House 
called the Council of the Empire, consist- 
ing of 196 members, half being nominated 
by the Emperor and half being elected. 
The Czar nominated his own Ministers, 
who were ex officio members of the Coun- 
cil. Of the 98 elected numbers the Monks 
selected three, the clergy three, the Cor- 
porations of Nobles eighteen, the Acade- 
mies of Science and the Universities six, 
the Chambers of Commerce six, the In- 



Restless Russia 



181 



dustrial Councils six, the Zemstvos thirty- 
four, Governments having no Zemstvos 
sixteen, and Poland six. Another body, 
called the Senate, had really nothing to 
do with legislative matters. It was ac- 
tually a sort of Supreme Court, but per- 
formed a great variety of functions. All 
its members were nominees of the Czar. 

Q. — What does "Soviet" mean? 

A. — It is the Russian word for council. 
It appears frequently in the newspaper 
dispatches as a brief and convenient syn- 
onym for the Council of Workmen's and 
Soldiers' Deputies. 

Q. — What are the various Russian 
"Councils"? 

A. — They spring from certain Work- 
men's, People's, Peasants' and Soldiers' 
Councils that were formed in several 
places in Russia during the disorders in 

1905- 

They were remembered when the 1917 
revolution came. The Petrograd Council 
of Workmen's and Soldiers' Deputies 
was organized before the Provisional 
Government was formed. The Petrograd 
Council was soon supplemented by dele- 
gates from other councils, and this en- 
larged council launched the important 
campaign for the publication of secret 
treaties, and for a general peace at the 
earliest possible moment. 

Then an All-Russian Congress of Coun- 
cils of Workmen's and Soldiers' Deputies 
held a joint session to discuss vast and 
radical economic reforms. 

The Congress adjourned in July, leav- 
ing a permanent executive committee, to 
which the Socialist ministers of the coa- 
lition cabinet were held responsible. The 
executive committee supported the Keren- 
sky Government until the Kornilov affair, 
when, under the influence of the Bolshe- 
viki, it began to take a more radical line 
again. 

The newly elected municipal govern- 
ments were tending to replace the Coun- 
cils of Workmen's and Soldiers' Deputies 
when the Bolsheviki uprising of Novem- 
ber, 1917, occurred. 

Q. — What is meant by the "Cama- 
rilla"? 

A. — "Camarilla" is a Spanish equivalent 
for the English "cabal." The name was 
applied to the group of men and women 
who surrounded the Czar. Among them 
were to be found politicians, generals, 
and priests. Some of them were, very 
probably, pro-German, and, previous to 



the revolution, were working for a sepa- 
rate peace. Others, like Rasputin, were 
primarily interested in gaining as much 
power and wealth as possible. The Czar 
and Czarina were influenced excessively 
by this group, and nothing of which they 
disapproved had much chance of reach- 
ing the ear or eye of Russia's autocrat. 

Q. — Who was Rasputin? 

A. — A Russian monk, known as the 
"holy devil" of the Russian Court, who 
is thought to have wielded extraordinary 
and fateful power over the Czarina, and, 
through her, over the Czar, and have ma- 
terially hastened the downfall of the 
Romanoff dynasty by inciting them to 
more and more merciless autocratic meas- 
ures and intolerant policies against lib- 
eralism. 

Q. — Why did the Bolsheviki refuse 
to let Ambassadors draw 
money from banks? 

A. — In order to compel the British 
Government to give the Bolsheviki Gov- 
ernment complete control of Russian 
funds in the Bank of England. In real- 
ity, the object was far greater than merely 
that of gaining access to funds. To ad- 
mit their right to the Russian funds 
meant to acknowledge the Bolsheviki 
Government. 

Q. — When was the Russian Con- 
stituent Assembly dissolved? 

A. — The Russian Constituent Assembly 
held its first meeting on January 18, 1918, 
and after a single turbulent session was 
dissolved by armed Bolshevist sailors in 
pursuance of a degree issued by Premier 
Lenine. The assembly was succeeded by 
the All-Russian Congress of Soviets 
(councils of workmen and soldiers), 
which held its first meeting on January 
22nd. 

Q. — What was the personnel of the 
American mission to Russia? 

A. — Elihu Root, Charles R. Crane, Gen- 
eral Hugh M. Scott, Rear-Admiral Glen- 
non, John R. Mott, Charles Edward Rus- 
sell, and Cyrus McCormick. 

Q. — What did Russia owe the 
United States when she with- 
drew from the war? 

A. — At that time Russia owed us $187,- 
779,000 — that is, we had advanced this 
money for Russian account to our 



1 82 



Questions and Answers 



own manufacturers and producers for 
goods. Many of these had been sent to 
Russia and were, presumably, piled up 
in Vladivostock when the Russians signed 
the peace with the Germans. The United 
States held Russian bonds as security for 
the loan, which was part of a total credit 
that had been established for $325,000,000. 

Q. — How many prisoners of war 
were in Russia in 191 8? 

A. — Apparently about Ij4 million Ger- 
mans and Austro-Hungarians, with a 
sprinkling of Turks and Bulgars. Most 
of the prisoners were Austro-Hungarians, 
for the Russian captures of German sol- 
diers were comparatively small, as fig- 
ures go in this huge war. Not all of 
these prisoners were soldiers, either. Rus- 
sia interned a very large number of Ger- 
mans and Austrians who were in her pos- 
session when war began. 

Q. — Did she send the prisoners to 
Siberia? 

A. — She sent most of them to Siberia. 
Little was said about it early in the war, 
because the name "Siberia" was recog- 
nized by the Allies as possibly conveying 
a sense of tragic exile and suffering. 
We must remember, however, that Siberia 
is not at all the forbidding country that 
past generations believed it to be. It is 
undeniable that the long journey through 
a country with inadequate rail facilities, 
and with very inadequate places of rest, 
was very hard ; but when the prisoners 
arrived at their destinations, they were, 
probably, not badly off. The innate kind- 
liness of the Russian population would 
do much to alleviate their lot as far as 
insufficient resources permitted. 

Q. — When was the Russian Red 
Army organized? 

A. — "The New Workmen's and Peas- 
ants' Red Army" was named in an offi- 
cial communication, January 31, 1918, of 
the Bolsheviki Government of Russia, as 
being ready to "serve to support the com- 
ing social revolution in Europe." 

Q. — When was the name of St. 
Petersburg changed to Petro- 
grad? 

A. — It was done by Imperial ukase on 
September 1, 1914. The city then had a 
population of well over 2,000,000, but 
after the Grand Duke evacuated Poland 
this was temporarily increased by almost 
another million. 



Q. — How many Prime Ministers 
has Russia had since the war? 

A. — Seven : Kokovtsoff , Goremykin, 
Sturmer, Trepoff, Prince Golitzin, Prince 
Lvoff and Kerensky. Then came the rule 
of Lenine and the Bolsheviki party. 

Q. — How many men did Russia 
send to the front in the first 
three months? 

A. — Russia put into the field during 
the first weeks of the war about a mil- 
lion and a quarter, which grew to per- 
haps two million and a half by the win- 
ter of 1914-1915. 

Q. — Did Tolstoy foretell events of 
the war? 

A. — In 1910 he wrote an essay ad- 
dressed to the Czar, the Kaiser, and King 
George, in which he foretold that com- 
mercialism would set the world afire with 
the flames of war and bigotry. He said : 

"The great conflagration will start 
about 1912, set by the torch of war, in 
the countries of southeastern Europe. It 
will develop into a destructive calamity 
in 1913. In that year I see all Europe 
in flames and bleeding. I hear the lam- 
entations of huge battlefields. But 
about the year 191 5 a strange figure from 
the north — a new Napoleon — enters the 
stage of the bloody drama. He is a man 
of little militaristic training, a writer or 
a journalist, but in his grip most of Eu- 
rope will remain till 1925. The end of the 
great calamity will mark a new political 
era for the old world. There will be left 
no empires and kingdoms, but the world 
will form a federation of the United 
States of Nations. There will remain 
only four great giants — the Anglo-Saxons, 
the Latins, the Slavs, and the Mongol- 
ians." 

Q. — Did Tolstoy not also prophesy 
a new Messiah? 

A. — Yes. In that same essay he said : 
"After the year 1925 I see a change in 
religious sentiments. Bigotry has brought 
about the fall of the church. The ethical 
idea has almost vanished. Humanity is 
without the moral feeling. But then a 
great reformer arises. He will clear the 
world of the relics of monotheism, and 
lay the cornerstone of the temple of pan- 
theism. God, soul, spirit, and immortal- 
ity will be molten in a new furnace, and 
I see the peaceful beginning of an ethical 
era. The man determined to this mission 
is a Mongolian-Slav. He is already walk- 



Restless Russia 



183 



ing the earth — a man of active affairs. 
He himself does not now realize the mis- 
sion assigned to him by a superior power." 

Q. — What is Brest-Litovsk ? 

A. — Brest-Litovsk is an eastern fron- 
tier town of Russian Poland, about one 
hundred miles east of Warsaw. It was 
the scene of the peace parleys between 
the Germans and the Russian Bolsheviki 
leaders, Trotzky and Lenine. 

Q. — When was the Czar over- 
thrown ? 

A. — The first news of the revolution of 
the Russian people and the abdication of 
Czar Nicholas came to the world on 
March 16, 1917. There were intimations 
two days before this that some political 
crisis was at hand, but the reports were 
so vague that they gave little clue to what 
was going on. On March 18 the Pro- 
visional Government issued its Appeal 
to the People, and this date has been ac- 
cepted as the beginning of the new 
regime. 

Q. — How are the Russians off for 
food and fuel? 

A. — One of the most reliable writers, 
who has recently been in Russia, reports 
as follows : 

"In Petrograd, though I was stopping 
at one of the most highly esteemed Rus- 
sian hotels, often in the morning the 
waiter would come up to my room with 
the cheerful tidings : 

" 'No sugar to-day ; no butter ; no eggs ; 
no milk.' And he would set before me 
a pot of clear bitter coffee, and a small 
chunk of soggy black bread. But when I 
made trips to the villages, in peasant 
huts I would be regaled by my hospitable 
host with white bread, rich, fresh milk, 
and also eggs and butter. I would fatten 
on the land for a time, and then would 
return to my meager life in that starved, 
elaborate hotel. 



"Not only was food scarce in the 
towns, but the people were dreading the 
winter with the low supply of fuel on 
hand, especially in Moscow. For, as a 
ride, the Russians use stove wood to heat 
their homes and, though the peasants had 
not seized the forests, they felt that these 
forests would soon be their own ; there- 
fore, last summer they refused to cut 
firewood for the towns." 

Q. — What does Russia owe for war 
loans alone? 

A. — It owes for loans made during the 
Czardom alone at least 25 billions. 



Q. — What did Russia do in the 
war? 

A. — Early in the war she invaded east- 
ern Prussia twice, but was driven back. 
Then she drove through eastern Galicia, 
and started invasion of Hungary through 
the Carpathians. 

In 1915 the Germans struck back hard, 
and pushed Russian armies out of Poland 
and to the Brest-Litovsk line. The Rus- 
sians lost Lemberg and Warsaw. 

In 1916 they drove forward again, and 
made a grand campaign into Galicia and 
Volhynia, drove the Turks almost wholly 
out of Armenia, threatened to smash the 
whole Austrian front, but suddenly were 
caught by a German counter-offensive and 
lost most of their gains. 

In 1917 the progressive weakening of 
the Russian front was becoming well 
known, despite the censorship, and sud- 
denly in March, the crisis came with the 
revolution which dethroned the Czar. 

In 1918 various parts of Russia began 
to declare their independence. On Feb- 
ruary 10, 1918, Russia was declared out 
of the war. There was a brief reaction 
which at first seemed important, but on 
March 3, iqi8, Russia made her initial 
peace with Germany. 



JAPAN AND MANCHURIA 



Q. — How far would Japan have to 
move troops to attack the Ger- 
mans? 

A. — She would have to move them 
from Harbin or Vladivostock over the 
Siberian Railroad, which is presumably 
in no very good condition. The length 
of the railroad from Vladivostock to 
Moscow is 5,392 miles. In addition, there 
are the sea transports from Japan to 
the Asiatic mainland, and the railroad 
transport to Japanese seaports from the 
concentration centers. Altogether, Ja- 
pan's troops would have to be moved 
double the distance across the American 
continent between New York and San 
Francisco. 



Q. — Is Manchuria Chinese terri- 
tory? 

A. — It is very old Chinese territory. It 
was the seat of the Manchu dynasty which 
ruled China for many centuries. But 
when Russia expanded through Siberia to 
the Pacific Ocean, and Japan stretched 
herself and looked toward the nearby 
Asiatic continent, Manchuria's geograph- 
ical position turned out to be unlucky — 
for China. Inland the territory lay in 
such a way that it blocked Russia's 
straight road to her Siberian port of 
Vladivostock. On the sea, its coast was 
opposite Japan. 

Q. — Is Manchuria very far north? 

A. — The easiest way to visualize the 
geography of Manchuria is to understand 
that the whole China coast, including 
Manchuria, occupies about the same lati- 
tudes as does the American coast from 
Cuba to Newfoundland. China proper 
extends about as far north as New York 
is in our hemisphere. Manchuria occupies 
the latitudes north from New York to 
Newfoundland. The geographical rela- 
tion of Japan to this territory may be 
understood if you will imagine the Jap- 
anese island empire lying along the 
American coast with its southern end 
only a hundred miles from Savannah, 
Georgia, and its northern end about 
equally near to Nova Scotia, while all 
the Atlantic Ocean between these two 
points is an inclosed sea — the Sea of 
Japan. 



Q. — Was the Russo-Japanese war 
about Manchuria? 

A. — Yes. From the time of her war 
with China, Japan had been watching the 
Asiatic mainland more jealously with 
every year. Russia, meantime, was 
thrusting herself against the northern 
border of China (Manchuria) with ever- 
increasing pressure. In 1900 came an 
opportunity. It was the famous "Boxer" 
uprising. Russia immediately proclaimed 
that law and order and the security of 
her Siberian frontiers obliged her to re- 
store tranquillity in China, and she moved 
into Manchuria. 

Then followed four years of intricate 
Asiatic politics which involved not merely 
Manchuria but Korea. Russia maintained 
her hold despite Japan's threats and coun- 
ter-moves, and the island empire sud- 
denly broke off diplomatic relations and 
began war on Russia February 8, 1904. 
Japan was victorious on land and sea. 



-How far is Japan from 
Asiatic mainland? 



the 



A. — The northern and southern ex- 
tremities of the Japanese group of islands 
swing in close to Asia. The rest of the 
group curves away in a huge crescent 
from the Asiatic mainland. Nippon, the 
biggest island, is 453 miles from Vladi- 
vostock, across the Sea of Japan. 



Q. — Was Chinese Manchuria cut 
up after the Russo-Japanese 
war? 

A. — It was not "cut up." It was ar- 
tistically and scientifically penetrated. By 
the Portsmouth peace treaty, Russia ceded 
to Japan not only the Chinese lease of 
Port Arthur, but also the railroad ex- 
tending northward into Manchuria for 
about five hundred miles. This is the 
railroad that runs northward to Harbin, 
the town where Chinese, Japanese and 
Russian interests come to a meeting 
point. 

Harbin is on the border between north- 
ern Manchuria and China proper, and it 
is, furthermore, on the Siberian railroad. 
Thus it is a "strategic junction point." 
In addition, it is not far from the Siberian 
border. 



184 



Japan and Manchuria 



185 



Q. — Did Russia take Siberia from 
China? 

A. — No. Russia did not, as a matter 
of fact, take Siberia from anybody. 
While English and Spanish sea-adven- 
turers were fighting for the golden lands 
of the Spanish Main in our hemisphere in 
Queen Elizabeth's time, a Cossack adven- 
turer, named Yermak, led a little band 
of men across the Urals from Russia, 
and added Siberia to the Czar's empire, 
practically by discovery. There was 
fighting with the Tartar tribes, but it was 
very desultory, and in less than a century 
the Russian sway touched the Pacific 
Ocean. In 1700 the autocracy began to 
"utilize" the wonderful new territory as a 
convenient place for imprisonment. 

Q. — Is Port Arthur Russian, Chi- 
nese or Japanese? 

A. — It is Chinese — technically. It is in 
Chinese territory. China fortified the city 
in 1891. Japan took it in the China-Jap- 
anese War, 1894. She was not permitted 
by the Powers to keep it. In 1898 Russia 
moved in and "acquired" it from China 
on a lease. In 1905, during the Russo- 
Japanese War, Japan took it from Russia 
after a long siege. 

Q. — How could Japan take Port 
Arthur from Russia if China 
owns it? 

A. — By the treaty of peace between 
Russia and Japan (signed in Ports- 
mouth, New Hampshire, in 1905) the 
Russian Government ceded the lease of 
Port Arthur and adjacent territories and 
waters to Japan. In 1915 China ex- 
tended the lease, making it run 99 years 
from that date. Thus Japan is secure in 
her possession of this foothold on the 
Asiatic continent until 2014. 

Q. — Where is Korea? 

A. — Korea is, geographically, a part of 
Manchuria, being a southern extension 
that thrusts an enormous peninsula be- 
tween the Sea of Japan and the Yellow 
or China Sea, and almost touches the 
southernmost islands of Japan with its 
extremity. The island group that has the 
famous Japanese port of Nagasaki on it 
is just across the Korean Straits from 
the Korean extremity. 

Q. — Is Port Arthur near Korea? 

A. — On the China or Yellow Sea side of 
the Korean Peninsula (toward the China 
mainland) is a huge gulf. Protruding 



into this gulf, between Korea and the 
Chinese province Chili (which has 
Pekin in it) is a big peninsula known as 
the Peninsula of Liaotung. The fortified 
city of Port Arthur is at its extremity. 
From the west coast of Korea to Port 
Arthur is 191 miles. 

Q. — Is Vladivostock near Port Ar- 
thur? 

A. — No. It is very much farther north, 
and the two places are separated by the 
Korean Peninsula and a whole lot of 
coast-line on both sides of the Peninsula. 
Vladivostock, if situated on our coasts, 
would occupy about the geographical po- 
sition of Boston. Port Arthur would be 
enough farther south to be about where 
Philadelphia is. 

To steam from Port Arthur to Vladi- 
vostock a ship must go down the Yellow 
Sea southward, then turn northeast 
through the Korean Straits between Japan 
and Korea, and then steer north through 
the Sea of Japan to Vladivostock. 

Q. — How long has Russia had 
Vladivostock? 

A. — More than half a century. Vladi- 
vostock was made into a great seaport 
and rail terminus as a logical part of 
Russia's expansion through Siberia. It is 
in real Siberian territory, not in Man- 
churia, though the Russian Siberian coast 
there stretches itself along the sea in such 
a way that Manchurian territory forms 
"hinter-land." 

Q. — Did Japan always own Korea? 

A. — Korea was an independent mon- 
archy, but Japan gradually extended her 
influence there and in 1910, by treaty, 
Korea was annexed to the island empire. 
The Korean Government appealed to the 
Powers of Europe for aid, but nothing 
was done. There followed a good deal 
of rebellion, or rather of revolutionary 
agitation by young Koreans, many of 
whom had been educated in Europe and 
America. These movements were sup- 
pressed in the usual way, and for a long 
time nothing has been heard of Korea. 

Q. — How many islands compose 
the Japanese group ? 

A. — There are 431 islands. Alto- 
gether their area in square miles is a 
little bigger than Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, 
Michigan and Wisconsin combined. They 
have three times the population, however, 
having 56 million people, a little more 



186 



Questions and Answers 



than half the total population of the 
United States and within 9 millions of the 
whole population of Germany. 

Q. — How far are the Philippines 
from Japan? 

A. — The northernmost point of the 
Philippine group (island of Luzon) is 
about 1,200 miles south from the Japanese 
port of Nagasaki on the extreme southern 
end of the Japanese group proper. Japan, 
however, has a base on the great island of 
Formosa, which lies off the South China 
coast. Between this island and the Philip- 
pines there are about 250 miles of sea. 

fQ. — Is Manila very far from Yoko- 
hama? 

A. — Relatively those two points occupy 
about the same geographical positions as 
do Hampton Roads, the American naval 
base in Chesapeake Bay, and the southern 
West Indies. Yokohama and Tokio (both 
lying on the same big harbor) would 
about correspond in position with Norfolk 
and Fortress Monroe (speaking roughly). 
The West Indian island of Martinique 
about corresponds in position with that of 
Manila. The Japanese base of Formosa 
is about half as far from Manila as our 
Cuban naval base, Guantanamo, is from 
Panama. 

Q. — What is the system of Japan's 
government? 

A. — It is governed under a constitution 
adopted in 1889. The Emperor exercises 
the executive power, with the assistance 
of Cabinet Ministers, and a Privy Council 
is called in for consultation on important 
matters. There is a parliament, known 
as the Imperial Diet. It consists of two 
houses, a House of Peers and a House 
of Representatives, and each House may 
initiate legislation, make representations 
to the Government on subjects regarding 
the nation, and present addresses to the 
Emperor. The House of Peers has 369 
members and the House of Representatives 
has 379. 

Q. — What is Japan's foreign 
trade? 

A. — For the calendar year 1917 the 
figures are : exports, 800 million dollars ; 
imports, 500 millions. In 1913 her ex- 
ports were 300 millions and her imports 
360 million dollars. 



Q. — What does Japan import 
mostly? 

A. — Iron and raw cotton are the big 
imports. Wool, machinery and copper 
come next in value. 



Q. — How big is Japan's merchant 
fleet? 

A. — Government encouragement of ship- 
building has given Japan a formidable 
merchant fleet in a very short period of 
time. At the end of 1916 there were 
3,759 steamships under the Japanese flag, 
with a gross tonnage of 1,716,104. The 
constructive ability of the country had 
been enhanced to such a degree that there 
were 224 private shipyards, and 61 pri- 
vate dry-docks in the islands. Vessels 
building in the beginning of 1917 were 
182, all more than 700 gross tons, and 
totaling about 638,000 tons. 



Q. — Is the Emperor still known 
as "Mikado"? 

A. — The title "Mikado" is an ancient ap- 
pellation, dating far back to Japan's early 
tribal and religious history. It has re- 
tained a deep romantic, poetic and spiri- 
tual meaning for the modern Japanese, 
but the title now used for the Emperor 
in modern Japanese speech is "Tenno," or 
"Tenshi" in the native speech. For of- 
ficial documents the title employed is 
"Kotei." which means "Imperial Ruler." 

Q. — What is the religion of the 
Japanese? 

A. — There are two chief forms of re- 
ligion — Shintoism, with about a dozen 
sects, and Buddhism, with about 9 sects. 
These are not State religions, and Japan 
has entire religious freedom. According 
to an enumeration of 1911, there were 
then in Japan 1,290 churches and preach- 
ing stations of the Roman Catholic, Greek 
Catholic and Protestant churches. Shintc 
priests numbered 74,141. Buddhist high 
priests and priestesses numbered 53,042. 
There were more than 100,000 Buddhist 
temples and shrines. In addition to these 
there are shrines dedicated to eminent 
ancestors of the Imperial house and to 
meritorious subjects. These are inde- 
pendent of any religious sect, and some 
are supported by State or local authority- 



Japan and Manchuria 



187 



Q. — Why did Japan enter the Eu- 
ropean war? 

A. — Japan explained her entry into the 
war by declaring that her treaty with 
Great Britain made it incumbent on her 
to do so. This was the Anglo-Japanese 
Treaty of 1902, made before the Russo- 
Japanese War. Its direct object, accord- 
ing to its clauses, was the maintenance 
of the situation then existent in Korea 
and Manchuria. It stipulated that should 
either of the parties to the treaty be- 
come involved in war with a single power, 
the other party should maintain "benevo- 
lent neutrality." If attacked by two pow- 
ers, the other was bound to come to its 
aid. 

In 1905 the treaty was extended to pro- 
tect British interests in India and Af- 
ghanistan, while Japan got a free hand in 
Korea. 

Q. — What were the famous 21 Jap- 
anese demands on China? 

A. — On January 18, 191 5, Japan sud- 
denly laid before China a series of de- 
mands relating most comprehensively to 
Shan-tung province, the Yangtse valley, 
South Manchuria and Eastern Mongolia. 
The demands were in five sections, and 
the most serious demands were in sec- 
tion five, which the Japanese failed to 
make public to the Allied powers or the 
world. In fact, there were denials sent 
out that there was such a section, but 
the Chinese Government published the 
fact. After long negotiations Japan de- 
livered an ultimatum, in May, 1915, and 
China accepted the four sections, leaving 
section five for future negotiations. The 
agreement transferred to Japan all the 
German rights in Shan-tung province, and 
extended the lease of Port Arthur and 
the South Manchurian railroad for 99 
years. There was another clause giving 
Japanese "preference in South Man- 
churia as foreign advisers, instructors, 
political, financial, military and police." 

Q. — What was the Japanese-Amer- 
ican Agreement? 

A. — On November 2, 1917, Viscount 
Ishii for Japan and Secretary Lansing 
for the United States exchanged notes 
clarifying the policy of the United States 
and Japan regarding China. The impor- 
tant points of the agreement were : "The 
Governments of {he United States and 
Japan recognize that territorial propin- 
quity creates special relations between 
countries, and consequently the Govern- 
ment of the United States recognizes that 



Japan has special interests in China, par- 
ticularly in the part to which her pos- 
sessions are contiguous. The territorial 
sovereignty of China, nevertheless, re- 
mains unimpaired, and the Government of 
the United States has every confidence in 
the repeated assurances of the Japanese 
Government that, while geographical po- 
sition gives Japan such special interests, 
they have no desire to discriminate 
against the trade of other nations. . . . 
Moreover, they mutually declare that they 
are opposed to the acquisition by any 
Government of any special rights or privi- 
leges that would affect the independence 
or territorial integrity of China, or that 
would deny to the subjects or citizens of 
any country the full enjoyment of equal 
opportunities in the commerce and indus- 
tries of China." The Chinese Govern- 
ment has issued a statement protesting 
and refusing to be bound by agreements 
concerning it entered into by other 
Powers. 

Q. — What active part did Japan 
take in the war? 

A. — In November, 1914, she forced the 
surrender of Kiaou-Chau, the province in 
China which Germany had acquired as in- 
demnity for the Boxer outrages, and from 
which as a base she was extending a rail- 
way system into China in furtherance of 
German commerce. 

Japan was Great Britain's ally in the 
East. She despatched an ultimatum to 
Germany August 15, 1914, demanding the 
departure of German ships from Chinese 
waters and the transfer of Kiaou-Chau 
to Japan as first step to its return to 
Chinese control. 

The time limit of the ultimatum was 
August 23, and on that day Japan de- 
clared war upon Germany. After a siege 
of eight weeks Kiaou-Chau was surren- 
dered and Germany's rule in the Far East 
was at an end. 

Q. — Did Japan agree to return 
Kiaou-Chau to China? 

A. — In her ultimatum to Germany, Aug- 
ust 16, 1914, Japan demanded of Germany 
that she deliver over her territory of 
Kiaou-Chau. The second clause in this 
ultimatum read : 

"Second — To deliver on a date not later 
than September 15 (1914), to the Im- 
perial Japanese authorities, without con- 
dition or compensation, the entire leased 
territory of Kiaou-Chau, with a view to 
the eventual restoration of the same to 
China." 



i88 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Did Japanese participate in the 
destruction of Admiral von 
Spee's fleet? 
A. — No. There were no Japanese ves- 
sels on the scene at all. They did help 
in a way, however, for they helped the 
Australia and other British ships chase 
von Spee out of the Pacific, around the 
Horn, to his fate off the Falklands. 

Q. — Did Japan have a secret treaty 
with the Czar? 

A. — Japan had a secret treaty with the 
Czar's Government. It was signed in 
June, 1916, between Sazonoff, then Rus- 
sian Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Vis- 
count Motono, Japanese Minister of 
Foreign Affairs. 

The treaty provided that if any other 
nation made war against either Russia or 
Japan over the Chinese question, the par- 
ties to the treaty should be allies in the 
war. 

The Trotzky-Lenine Government found 
the treaty in the Russian secret files and 
immediately made it public. 

Q. — How big is Japan's navy? 

A.— Japan stands fifth among naval 
powers, with Great Britain, the _ United 
States, Germany and France leading her. 
In 1917 she had 10 dreadnaughts built and 
completing, 26 pre-dreadnaughts and ar- 
mored cruisers, 25 protected cruisers, 
scouts, etc., 77 destroyers, 26 torpedo 
boats, and 16 submarines. 

Q. — How big is Japan's army? 

A. — Japan has universal obligatory 
military service, her population being di- 
vided into various "bans," or reserve lines, 
much on the German model. The "peace- 
strength" (which apparently means the 
standing army and the men serving their 
military course at the time) is given as 
about a quarter of a million men. The 
war strength is about 30,000 men in the 
regular army, 200,000 in the reserves, one 
million as reinforcements, and_ a large 
force of territorial army material whose 
size is not stated. 

Q. — Can Japan support her own 
population agriculturally ? 

A. — Japanese experts hold that if the 
people would cultivate land at present un- 
used which is inclined at an angle of less 
than 15 degrees (terracing and otherwise 
improving these hill-sides like the Chi- 
nese) the area of arable land in Japan 
might be doubled. It is estimated that in 



Hokkaido, the northernmost island of the 
archipelago, there is enough uncultivated 
land to take care of the surplus Japanese 
population for many years to come. As 
the people farm now, they are crowded so 
densely in limited areas that, though the 
population of Japan actually is less dense 
than that of England or Belgium, the pop- 
ulation per square mile occupied is given 
approximately as follows : England 466, 
Belgium 702, Japan 2,688. This would 
give the Japanese at present less than a 
quarter-acre of land for each person. 

Q. — Is the cost of living notably 
low in Japan? 

A. — The actual cost of living is not so 
low as might be thought, but the Jap- 
anese workman does without the comforts 
and pleasures enjoyed by his fellow work- 
man in other lands. Not only is thrift 
required, but great self-denial, to make 
ends meet in the Mikado's kingdom. The 
price of rice is practically the same in 
Japan as_ it is in America. Sugar and 
salt cost practically the same in Japan as 
in England. Tea is cheaper, but fuel is 
much dearer. Meat is more expensive in 
Japan, but fish is cheaper. Beef sells in 
Japan at 25 cents per pound, horse meat 
at 13 cents, and pork at 14 cents. These 
are for the cheapest cuts. Butter, cheese, 
milk and cream are about as expensive in 
Japan as they are in England. Eggs are 
cheaper there ; the best grades selling the 
year round at 18 cents a dozen, but the 
eggs of Japan are small and of inferior 
quality. Rent is cheaper, but the houses 
are of very light construction, and give 
no protection from the cold of winter. 
Clothing in the European style costs 
about the same in Japan as in England. 
Japanese clothing is actually more ex- 
pensive than European, and many Jap- 
anese adopt the foreign style of dress out 
of motives of economy. But, of course, 
the poor Japanese spend much less on 
dress than we do ; in fact, during the 
greater part of the year the climate is 
such that the lower classes seldom wear 
much more than the compulsory loin 
cloth. 

Q. — Please give some idea of the 
wages paid in Japan. 

A. — Official reports in 1913 gave the 
following daily wages: Silk spinners, 30 
sen (15 cents) ; weavers, 21 cents; dyers, 
25 cents ; tailors, 29 cents ; shoemakers, 
37 cents ; carpenters, 44 cents ; plasterers, 
46 cents ; stone-cutters, 50 cents ; print- 
ers, 27 cents. 

These wages were not for an 8-hour 
day, but for from 10 to 16 hours. 



Japan and Manchuria 



189 



Q. — Is there a Socialist movement 
in Japan? 

A. — Yes. It is, however, strongly re- 
pressed by the Government. In 191 1 
twelve leaders of a very radical socialist 
movement were charged with plotting the 
assassination of the Mikado. They were 
executed January 25, 191 1, and from that 
time the Government has strictly pro- 
hibited the Socialist movement. In spite 
of this, it is said that the teaching is 
spreading among the common people. 



Q. — Who were the Samurai? 

A. — They were the military class of old 
Japan — largely retainers supported by 
feudal chiefs. Socially they stood next 
below the throne and the nobles. Below 
them (very far below) came the com- 
mon people. They were fierce, giving 
their enemies no quarter. But they had 
a decidedly high code of honor of their 
own. 



COST OF WAR (AMERICA) 



Q. — What does the whole war cost 
the world every minute? 

A. — Counting the United States expend- 
itures in, it was estimated early in 1918 
(on the basis of the most conservative 
and exact figures available) that the 
money cost alone was $80,000 a minute. 
A United States Government estimate of 
the daily expenditures of all the belliger- 
ents would make the sum per minute $81,- 
249. This estimate (published March 1, 
1918) was that the rate of daily expendi- 
ture then was $116,700,000. 

Q. — How does the whole war-cost 
compare with world- wealth? 

A. — All the wheat lands of the globe, 
producing at maximum capacity (say 
2,500,000,000 bushels at $2 a bushel), could 
not pay the cost in less than a quarter- 
century. All the gold mined in the last 
65 years (from 1850 to 1916) could not 
pay more than 1/7 of the cost of the first 
three years of war. All the revenues for 
a year of all the nations in the world, if 
they were all put together, would pay only 
15 per cent of the mere money cost from 
August, 1914, to April, 1918. The money 
that one year of war costs would almost 
pay all the national debts of every coun- 
try in the entire world, from the United 
States to Siam. 

Q. — What does the war cost Amer- 
ica alone monthly ? 

A. — In round figures, V/2 billion dollars 
a month (in July, 1918). 

The exact figures were : November, 
1917, $982,000,000; December, 1917, $1,105,- 
000,000; January, 1918, $1,090,000,000; 
February, 1918, $1,002,878,608; of which 
$665,400,000 was for war expenses, and 
$325,000,000 was for loans to the Allies. 

Q. — How does our war-bill compare 
with normal expenditures? 

A. — Frank A. Vanderlip, of the Na- 
tional City Bank, New York, says that, 
whereas the total expenditures of the 
United States Treasury since its first or- 
ganization under Alexander Hamilton 
down through the War of 1812, the Civil 
War, and the Spanish War (including 
expenses of these wars, and for every 
other purpose whatsoever connected with 



the government), have amounted to a lit- 
tle more than $26,000,000,000, we are 
now undertaking to spend in a single year 
no less than $21,000,000,000 (for all pur- 
poses, including war). 

Q. — Are not interest charges on 
war-debts enormous? 

A.— The United States, at the end of 
one year only, had obligated itself to pay 
$225,000,000 annually as interest on loans. 
(Much of this would be offset by interest 
received on money advanced to the Allies.) 
Great Britain's interest charges at the end 
of four years exceeded one billion dollars 
annually — a sum larger than its normal 
peace expenditures. 

Q. — To what extent are we lend- 
ing money to the Allies? 

A. — Soon after our entrance into the 
war, Congress authorized loans to na- 
tions "at war with enemies of the United 
States." By the end of 1917, $7,000,000,- 
000 had been authorized, and more than 
$4,000,000,000 had been advanced. Of 
this, Great Britain had received nearly 
half, France one-fourth, and the rest had 
gone to Italy, Russia, Belgium, and Ser- 
bia. These loans took the form of cred- 
its for the purchase of supplies, the 
United States Government accepting in 
return securities issued by the foreign 
governments. 



Q. — Is there so much money in the 
world? 

A. — There is not nearly enough actual 
cash in the world to even begin to pay 
the running expenditures of the world for 
war. If all the belligerents were con- 
fronted suddenly with the inexorable ne- 
cessity of paying instantly, in actual cash, 
for everything as they get it or use it, 
they would simply have to stop right then 
and there. It would be physically im- 
possible to find the cash. 

For instance, the money in the whole 
United States on March 1, 1918, was 
$6,351,584,056. That is, if the govern- 
ment could have gotten every cent that 
every individual owned, if it could have 
scraped every bank and every business 
clean, it could not have raised even 
enough cash to pay out the $7,000,000,000 
loans to the Allies authorized by Con- 
gress. 



190 



Cost of War (America) 



191 



Q. — How can the war continue if 
cash is lacking? 

A. — Even in peace there is never 
enough cash in the world actually to pay 
"on the nail" for the business that is done 
by the world. The big fact is that cash 
(currency) is only a token. Even gold 
is valuable only because the world 
chooses to call it so. Credit is the real 
world-medium. The world pays itself 
with paper that has credit (trust) behind 
it. All the national paper currency of 
the world is essentially not different from 
the notes, bills of lading, invoices, and 
other paper, which form the bulk of the 
world's commercial structure. Even coins 
are valuable mostly because of the credit 
of the government that issues them. In- 
trinsically they may not be worth much. 
You might, for instance, have to hawk an 
American copper cent pretty far and wide 
if you were forced to use it simply on its 
value as copper, though the copper is 
there, sure enough. We have seen what 
has happened to the Russian rouble, and 
the German mark. Yet, technically, these 
values are supposed to be backed by actual 
coin. 

Q. — Just what do the billion-figures 
mean? 

A. — "Billions" really are so big that 
even the financial expert does not get a 
sharp image in his mind. We can all 
understand hundreds, thousands, and even 
millions ; but "billions" mean only dead 
mathematical figures to most of us. 

We can give you a sort of picture, how- 
ever — of the significance of our war- 
loans, for instance. Let us take the ex- 
act figures, which were (on January 26, 
1918) 4 billions, 247 millions, and 400 
thousand dollars. That sum (handled 
within a few months, indeed, almost in 
a few weeks) was \y 2 times the size of 
our whole national debt at the end of the 
Civil War. 

Q. — Can the huge war-loans pos- 
sibly be re-paid? 

A. — That is a question that the world's 
greatest financiers have not been able- to 
answer. If the debts to us stood alone, 
they would not be so very enormous as 
compared with the possible resources of 
the Allied nations. But, in view of the 
enormous wastage of the war, it is quite 
impossible to calculate how normal reve- 
nues may be restored, and how enough 
additional revenues may be raised to pay 
the huge accumulations of abnormal debt. 



Q. — How did we pay our Civil War 
debt? 

A. — Although the national debt at the 
end of the Civil War was not altogether 
three billions of dollars, it was a sum 
which simply appalled men in that gen- 
eration, for the world was absolutely pa- 
rochial in finances as compared with to- 
day. The whole world stared aghast at 
the debt. Many perfectly honorable and 
talented men saw no possible way out of 
it except by repudiation. 

But the war had hardly closed, When 
an entire new world of wealth was torn 
open almost over night. The armies that 
had been fighting turned to a new and 
wonderful fight. They fought to open the 
great West. They burst into the plains. 
They built the Union Pacific transcon- 
tinental railroad. It was as if a new and 
bountiful continent suddenly had been 
added to the earth. By 1893, the great 
debt had dwindled down to $893,000,000. 
Forty-two years after the war (1907), the 
last penny had been paid, and it had 
been paid by new and ever-increasing 
wealth that sprang from the new territory, 
so that individual citizens hardly even 
knew that there was a national debt. 

Q. — Is any hidden world-wealth 
left to pay for this war? 

A. — There is a huge amount that is ab- 
solutely untouched or has been only par- 
tially exploited. Even in old Europe, 
crowded and intensively exploited though 
it seems, there is a great deal. It may be 
that Germany, France, Belgium, Holland, 
Switzerland, and the United Kingdom 
have exploited their natural wealth pretty 
closely; but the other countries of Eu- 
rope, each and every one, still conceal 
treasures that require only concerted and 
earnest effort to produce very great 
values. 

Q. — What are some of the hidden 
resources of Europe? 

A. — Spain's mines and agricultural re- 
sources, especially herds, with the result- 
ing leather and food products ; Italy's 
Campagna, which, by sanitation (to elim- 
inate pernicious malaria), can be made to 
produce at least doubly; Russia's oil- 
fields, which alone should produce enough 
under modern scientific development to 
replace a vast part of the world's coal ; 
the wheat-fields of Russian Ukraine, often 
said to be the richest black earth in the 
known world ; Serbia's wheat-fields and 
copper mines ; Roumania's oil-wells ; the 
forests of Norway and Sweden, and, 



192 



Questions and Answers 



greater still, the wonderful and practic- 
ally unused water-powers of Norway, 
which alone could do the work now done 
for the world by extravagant use of mil- 
lions of tons of coal. 

Q. — Is there unused world-terri- 
tory comparable to our West in 
1865? 

A. — Yes. Siberia is a bigger territory 
than the whole United States, and it 
should prove to be even richer in both 
agricultural and mining possibilities than 
was the West of 1865. Siberia alone 
might well pay the debts of all the world. 
You must get out of your mind the old 
idea of Siberia as a forbidding country. 
You must think of it as you think of the 
United States — a country that has bleak 
Alaska and semi-tropical Florida within 
it. Siberia has territory that remains 
frozen the year around. It also has terri- 
tories so mild that tropical beasts like the 
tiger dwell in it. If the European world 
were working in unison, to build rail- 
roads on a colossal scale into Siberia and 
across Russia, the wealth that might be 
expected to flow back would very prob- 
ably pay the whole war wastage within 
two generations, and almost without bur- 
den on European people. 

Q. — How does Siberia compare 
with the United States? 

A. — In area Siberia has 4,800,000 (odd) 
square miles as against 2,974,000 square 
miles of the United States. The Siberian 
population is so small that it amounts to 
only 2 inhabitants to the square mile 
against 31 inhabitants to the square mile 
in our country. Siberia has only 15 im- 
portant cities against more than 125 very 
thriving and important American cities. 
All the railroads in Siberia have only 
8,000 miles of track against more than 
255,000 miles in the United States. 

Q. — Would the Berlin-Bagdad 
Railroad do much toward new 
wealth? 

A. — Yes. It would tap the ancient 
scene of the only truly scientific agricul- 
ture that the earth once knew. In Asia 
Minor the civilizations of Assyria and the 
Semites had irrigation works on a scale 
that would be considered majestic even 
to-day. They extracted from that great 
Asiatic peninsula almost everything that 
they actually needed — lumber, grains, 
meats, textile materials. They, or rather 
their degenerated successors, over-ex- 
ploited the territory. They cut down the 



forests, for one thing; and that one thing 
alone meant the doom of the area, for 
when the forests (the earth's storage 
plants for rainfall) were destroyed, the 
rainfalls made floods that tore the soil 
from mountain-sides and valleys and left 
them bare ; and when there was no rain- 
fall, there was no stored water to con- 
tinue to feed the parched land. The irri- 
gation works became useless, and were 
abandoned. The inhabitants became 
wretched. All these things can be re- 
stored now. 

Q. — What is the size of the Asia 
Minor territory? 

A. — Asia Minor has 200,000 square 
miles — an area that compares closely with 
that of New York, New Jersey and Penn- 
sylvania put together (245,500 square 
miles). The Asia Minor territory con- 
tains 17 million acres under some sort of 
cultivation. Of minerals it contains 
chrome (valuable for steel making), as- 
phalt, coal, lignite, petroleum, salt, iron, 
salt, emery and meerschaum. The iron 
mines (worked by very primitive meth- 
ods) produce 40,000 tons a year even 
now. 

Q. — Are there other areas to be 
exploited? 

A. — China, exploited in a large and 
noble sense, could be made to enrich its 
own teeming multitudes and still to send 
forth prodigal riches to the rest of us. 
The same is true of Africa. But such 
exploitation, if it is to make the world 
really richer, must not be individual ex- 
ploitation by any one nation or group of 
nations. Here we see the great new 
spiritual, as well as material, value of the 
American idea of the "open door." It 
must be made a door that is open to fine 
and magnanimous world-effort, not to rob- 
bers. 

Q. — What does America's war 
share cost an American citizen 
per day? 

A. — At one billion dollars a month, and 
figuring the population of the United 
States as approximately 100 million peo- 
ple, one year of war would cost each 
American $120 a year, or 2>~V% cents a 
day. 

Q. — What does every minute of 
war cost us Americans alone? 

A. — At the rate of twelve billion dollars 
a year, every minute costs us $22,831. 
Take out vour watch and look at the sec- 



Cost of War {America) 



193 



ond-hand. Every time it moves, the coun- 
try will have spent $380.50 for the war, 
as based on that computation. But in 
September, 1918, it was announced that 
Government expenses were at the rate of 
$40,446 a minute. That would make each 
second cost $674.10. This figure includes 
all expenditures, such as war loans, etc. 
Q. — What caused this great rise? 

A. — It was caused by a sudden leap in 
war expenditure for August, 1918. The 
month's outlay reached $1,805,513,000. 
This was more than 200 millions heavier 
than the previous highest monthly record 
of expenditures since the war began. 

Q. — Was most of the money spent 
on the army? 

A. — Of the entire amount $1,524,901,000 
went for army and navy, ships and other 
direct war expenses. 

Q. — How did we pay the first 
year's war cost? 

A. — The sources of money supply for 
government expenditures in the twelve 
months to June 30, 19/8, are presented 
below : 

RECEIPTS 

First Loan $ 520,456,339 

Second Loan 3,807,864,835 

Third Loan 3,237,714,637 

War Savings Stamps 307,092,391 

Customs, Internal Revenue 

and miscellaneous taxes 3,658,546,510 

Total $11,531,674,712 

Part of the payment of the first loan 
carried into the fiscal year ending June 
30, 1918, although the loan was promoted 
in the fiscal year 1917, and only 75 per cent 
of the third loan had been paid for when 
the Treasury closed its books for that 
year. In July, 1917, receipts from taxes, 
due in the preceding fiscal year, were 
$641,000,000, so the actual revenues from 
which the Government had a right to ap- 
portion expenditures were approximately 
$12,175,000,000. 

Q. — What were our expenditures 
in the first fiscal war year? 

A. — Our expenditures during the fiscal 
year to June 30, 1918 (the actual first war 
year ended April, 1918) were as follows : 
expenditures directly for the operation of 
the United States Government, and includ- 
ing interest on the public debt of $189,- 



743,277, were $7,874,386,324. To this must 
be added $4,738,029,750 for purchases of 
obligations of foreign governments (loans 
to our Allies), $64,160,000 for purchase of 
Farm Loan bonds, and $19,268,000 rep- 
resenting payments on account of the 
Panama Canal, or a grand total of $12,- 
706,652,470. The appropriations for the 
fiscal year 1918 were about $16,000,000,000, 
but it was found impossible to spend more 
than 75 per cent of this sum. 

Q. — How much did the war and 
navy departments spend? 

A. — The appropriations for the War 
Department for the fiscal year 1918 were 
$8,693,046,485. Up to May 31, 1918, the 
Department had spent $4,848,467,874. The 
appropriations for the same period for 
the Navy Department were $1,544,178,035 
and the expenditures up to May 31, J918, 
were $1,223,752,923. 

Q.— How much did our expendi- 
tures rise in the second war 
year? 

A. — The estimates for the year June 30, 
1918 — June 30, 1919, were for the vast 
sum of 24 billion dollars. 

Q. — How much of this was approp- 
riated for the War and Navy 
Departments? 

A. — The appropriations for 1919 were 
$12,085,211,114 for the War Department 
and $1,607,468,416 for the Navy Depart- 
ment. 

Q. — What other large costs were 
there? 

A. — The following costs were incidental 
to war and properly chargeable as was 
costs: first, $1,830,338,203 for an urgent 
deficiency and a general deficiency and an 
additional urgent deficiency act, which 
would about cover the needs of the va- 
rious new departments and commissions 
that had been compelled by the war pro- 
gram. Another $1,000,000,000 was to be 
set aside for the "revolving fund" of thf 
railroads and for the War Finance Cor- 
poration. The sum of $844,507,368 was 
allocated to the payment of interest on the 
public debt, for sinking funds and for the 
expenses of preparation and issuance of 
loans. Not many persons realize prob- 
ably, that within the fiscal year 1917-1918 
interest payments alone on the public debt 
of the United States were equal to the 
principal of the public debt in April, 
1917. 



194 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Has the United States ever de- 
faulted on its obligations? 

A. — Never. Some of the states re- 
pudiated bonds and other obligations, but 
even these cases were based on a plea of 
justification. Some states repudiated 
bond issues by negro and "carpet-bag" 
legislatures during reconstruction after 
the Civil War. There has been much 
conflict of opinion about the justice of 
this attitude, and the general belief ap- 
pears to be that, whether the pleas in ex- 
tenuation are sound or not, it would have 
been far better for the credit of the whole 
country had the obligations been honored, 
even though they were fraudulently laid. 
However, these were purely local debts. 
The Federal Government has so well met 
all its obligations that a United States 
bond is one of the best securities any- 
where in the world. 

Q. — Could the war-debts be wiped 
out without new sources of 
wealth ? 

A. — Yes, they might be, though no one 
is daring enough to prophesy that they 
actually can be. At best, such a settle- 
ment would have to be adjusted over a 
long period of years. If a nation could 
survive economically with war taxes con- 
tinued after peace has come, the debt 
might possibly be wiped out in a single 
generation. Great Britain, at the end of 
its third fiscal year, had produced one dol- 
lar in war taxes for every seven dollars 
of war expenditure. Some lucrative 
forms of war taxation would end with 
the war, and substitutes would have to Fe 
found. 

Q. — What does the war cost all the 
four nations? 

A— At the end of the first four years 
of war (July, 1918), and counting only 
the actual cash spent by the European 
belligerents and not the war damages 
(which are literally incalculable), the 
total was estimated officially in Washing- 
ton as a little more than 144H? billions of 
dollars, with the cost per month increas- 
ing steadily. The detailed official figures 



United States $11,390,000,000 

United Kingdom 27,500,000,000 

France 20,366,000,000 

Russia 22,000,000,000 



Italy 7,722,000,000 

Other Allies 8,641,000,000 

Total $97,619,000,000 

Germany $30,351,000,000 

Austria-Hungary 14,021,000,000 

Bulgaria and Turkey 2,648,000,000 

Total $47,020,000,000 

Grand total $144,639,000,000 

Q. — What were the total war bor- 
rowings of the European bel- 
ligerents? 

A. — There has been some wonderfully 
complex financing and this, together with 
statements made purposely intricate (to 
mislead the enemy), has perplexed even 
astute financial experts. The U. S. Com- 
mittee on Public Information announced 
early in 1918: 

"As long ago as in April, 1916, the ap- 
proximate amounts of the loans con- 
tracted for war purposes by the different 
belligerent powers were stated to be $19,- 
881,731,110 for the Allies (of which sum 
$7,003,145,000 was for Great Britain and 
$6,590,053,000 for France), and $9,206,- 
750,000 for the enemy powers ($6,415,- 
250,000 for Germany). This was a grand 
total of $29,088,481,110 for all war loans. 

Many new ones have, of course, been 
made since the date mentioned. 

Q. — How do American war-loan 
subscriptions compare with 
the British? 

A. — After two and a half years of war, 
Britain floated a loan of $5,000,000,000, 
with 5,289,000 subscribers. In its second 
loan (limited to $4,500,000,000), the 
United States (with twice Britain's popu- 
lation) received applications for $4,617,- 
532,000 from 9,500,000 subscribers. 

Q. — How much did the United 
States take from individual 
incomes? 

A. — Before the new income taxes were 
laid on by the big eight-billion-dollar reve- 
nue bill of 1918, the income tax (levied un- 
der the 1917 revenue bill) was: minimum 
incomes taxed, $1,000 (single), $2,000 
(married). Additional graduated taxes on 
incomes exceeding $5,000 a year. This 
1917 measure taxed incomes between $5,000 
and $7,500 1 per cent in addition to old tax ; 



Cost of War (America) 



195 



$7,500 and $10,000, 2 per cent; $10,000 and 
$12,000, 3 per cent; $12,500 and $15,000, 
4 per cent; over $500,000, from 50 per 
cent up to 63 per cent. 

Q. — What is the purpose of War 
Savings Stamps and Certifi- 
cates? 

A. — To encourage thrift and to enable 
persons with meager incomes to lend even 
small sums to the Government. Stamps 
affixed to a certificate are redeemable 
in five years at $5 each. They cost from 
$4.12 in January, 1918, with an increase 
of 1 cent for each succeeding month. 
Thrift stamps were also issued, costing 
25 cents each, bearing no interest, but 
exchangeable for War Savings Stamps, 
which do bear interest as shown. 

Q. — What were our cash assets in 
February, 1918. 

A. — The total cash assets of the Gov- 
ernment were $4,027,919,548, which in- 
cluded $2,401,135,506 gold, $491,673,559 
silver, and the balance of the general 
fund. 

Q. — How has the United States 
sought to finance its war ac- 
tivities? 

A. — By increasing national income 
(taxation), and by borrowing money (do- 
mestic loans). 

Q. — What were the principal war- 
taxes in the revenue measure 
of 1917? 

A. — The revenue bill of October 13, 
1917, carried a so-called "excess profits" 
tax, while income taxes and postal rates 
were increased, and additional imposts 
were placed on liquor and tobacco. 
There were also war-taxes on theater and 
railway tickets, club dues, and various 
minor imposts. 

Q. — How much income can we fig- 
ure on? 

A. — The Treasury Department figured 
that in the fiscal year (July 1, 1917, to 
July, 1918) the receipts from our internal 
taxes would be $3,400,000,000. 

Customs and miscellaneous revenue 
had swelled the ordinary receipts early in 
1918 to $768,677,000, and receipts from lib- 
erty loans, certificates, war savings and 
other public debt sources had been $9,811,- 
668,000, making the government's total 



receipts in the first 8 months of war $10,- 
583,684,000. The war-savings movement 
brought $75,000,000 in three months. 

Q. — How many bonds did the 
United States issue during its 
first year of war? 

A. — Two "Liberty Loans" were issued 
to the public in 1917, and a third was 
opened for subscription in April, 1918. 
The first loan, bearing 3^ per cent inter- 
est, was offered in June, 191 7, and was 
limited to $2,000,000,000. The total 
amount subscribed was $3,035,226,850, an 
over-subscription of about 50 per cent. 
The number of subscriptions were more 
than 4,000,000. The second loan at 4 per 
cent, was offered in October, 1917, and 
was limited to $3,000,000,000 and 50 per 
cent of subscriptions in excess of that 
amount. More than 9,000,000 subscribers 
subscribed $4,617,532,300. The third loan 
had 17,000,000 subscribers who subscribed 
$4,176,516,850. The fourth loan, opened 
September 28, 1918, was for six billions. 

Q. — Have many bonds been sold 
again by investors? 

m A. — The Secretary of the Treasury es- 
timated on March 1, 191 8 — after eight 
months of trading — that about $180,000,- 
000 worth of the bonds had been resold. 
This was approximately 3 per cent of the 
total then issued by the Government. 
Many of the same bonds, however, had 
been sold over and over again. 

Q. — How does the war cost com- 
pare with investment in nav- 
ies? 

A. — The combined sum spent in 1913 
by Great Britain, Germany, and the 
United States on their navies for con- 
struction, maintenance, pay, cruising, re- 
pairs, coal and docking would pay for 
just 4 days and 8 hours of the war. 

Q. — Is there a widely circulated 
dollar coin that has no legal 
recognition? 

A. — Yes. It is known as the Maria 
Theresa dollar, and is widely used 
throughout Arabia and northeastern Af- 
rica, though it has absolutely no sanc- 
tion of any government behind it, and, in- 
deed, has been declared a prohibited 
article more than once. It is a silver dol- 
lar with the image of Maria Theresa, 
the famous Empress of Austria, and it is 
reported that the Arab traders used to 
circulate as many as 200 millions of them, 



196 



Questions and Answers 



and were doing so when the war began. 

This silver coin originally was minted 
by Austria in Maria Theresa's time. She 
was beautiful, and her image appealed to 
the Orientals. When the Austrian Gov- 
ernment ceased to mint or use the coin, 
they continued to mint it and have been 
minting it ever since — a private, unlegal- 
ized piece of money that still bears the 
date of the original genuine coins — 1780. 

Lately great quantities of this curious 
"people's money" have been coming into 
the assay offices of the world, because the 
high price of silver has induced the trad- 
ers to deliver the coins to be melted. 

Q. — What have our previous wars 
cost? 

A.— The War of 1812 with Great Brit- 
ain cost us 120 millions, in round figures. 
The war with Mexico cost us 173 millions, 
in round figures. The Civil War cost 
the North alone 3 billions, 480 millions. 
The Spanish-American War cost 1 billion, 
905 millions. 

Q. — What did our past wars cost 
per year? 

A. — The War of 1812 cost us at the 
rate of 44 millions a year. The Mexican 
War cost at the rate of 77 millions a 
year. The Civil War costs were at the 
rate of 580 millions a year. The Span- 
ish-American War (which lasted as an 
active military war less than a year), cost 
at the rate of 2 billions, 540 millions a 
year — that is, if it had continued actively 
throughout a whole year, at the rate of 
expenditure, it would have amounted to 
that sum. 

These figures show strikingly how the 
cost of war has increased with each gen- 
eration. 



Q. — What has modern Europe 
spent for wars? 

A. — According to the United States 
Treasury Department, the figures are, ex- 
clusive of the Franco-Prussian War: 

1793-1815 England and 

France $6,250,000,000 

1812-1815 France and Rus- 
sia 450,625,000 

1828 Russia and Turkey. . 100,000,000 
1830-1840 Spain and Por- 
tugal (civil war) 250,000,000 

1830-1847 France and Al- 
geria 190,000,000 

1848 Revolts in Europe 50,000,000 

1854-1856 England 371,000,000 

France 332,000,000 

1854-1856 Sardinia and 

Turkey 128,000,000 

Austria 68,600,000 

Russia 800,000,000 

France 75,000,000 

1859 Austria 127,000,000 

Italy 51,000,000 

1864 Denmark, Prussia, and 

Austria 36,000,000 

1866 Prussia and Austria.. 330,000,000 
1864-1870 Brazil, Argentina, 

and Paraguay 240,000,000 

1 865- 1 866 France and Mex- 
ico 65,000,000 

1876-1877 Russia .... 806,547,489 

Turkey 403,273,745 

1900-1901 Transvaal Repub- 
lic and England 1,000,100,000 

1904-1905 Russia and Japan 2,500,000,000 
The cost of the Balkan 

wars 1,264,000,000 

The total sum is a little over 15 billions 
880 millions. 



COST OF WAR (ALLIES) 



Q. — What have all the world's 
wars cost? 

A. — All the wars of the world (count- 
ing in the tremendous Napoleonic wars 
and all our American wars) cost 24 bil- 
lions 100 millions. The present war had 
cost I44J4 billions up to July, 1918. 

Q. — Is it true that war-expenses are 
at an ever-increasing rate? 

A. — In Great Britain during the first 
four months of the struggle, the expendi- 
ture averaged 41/3 million dollars a day. 
During the first quarter of 1915 the daily 
rate passed above 7 million dollars. By 
July of that year it was 15 millions, and 
three months later it was 17J/2 millions. 
By February, 1916, the rate was 22 mil- 
lion dollars ; by May, 25 millions, and by 
October, 1916, 28>4 million dollars a day. 
Since then the daily rate has passed 30 
million dollars. On March 7, 1918, Bonar 
Law, Chancellor of the Exchequer, an- 
nounced that the Empire's daily war-ex- 
penses (up to February 9, 1918) had be- 
come $31,906,362. On July 30, 1918, it had 
risen to $34,920,000 a day. 
Q. — How long would it be before 

the British war-debt could be 

wiped out? 

A. — A careful (though anonymous) 
published analysis has shown that even 
with double the ordinary peace revenue, 
Britain's war-debt (up to 1918) could 
not be paid off until 43 years had 
gone by — and that would mean, you must 
note, the entire use of the entire revenues 
for nothing else except to pay off interest 
and debt. 

Q. — How much gold is there in 
sovereigns ? 

A. — Eleven-twelfths of a sovereign is 
gold and one-twelfth is copper, but the 
gold in the sovereign is worth the face 
value of the coin. From one ounce of 
standard gold (11/12 fine) sovereigns to 
the value of £3 17s. io^4d. are coined. 
In other words, a sovereign is an ingot of 
standard gold 123.27447 grains weight. 
Being of an established weight of gold, it 
gives full gold value in whatever form 
it may be, since Great Britain has free 
coinage. The State loses the value of 
the alloy and the workmanship in making 
sovereigns. 



Q. — What is Free Coinage: 

A. — Free coinage means that the Gov- 
ernment does not make a profit by coining 
a precious metal. It means that any per- 
son can deliver any quantity of gold to 
the mint and receive an equivalent amount 
of gold back in sovereigns with the alloy 
given in free. 



worth in 



Q. — What is a sovereign 
American money? 

A.— It is worth $4.8665. This is the ex- 
act change you would get in normal times 
if you exchanged a sovereign at your 
bank. For convenience in figuring, the 
value of a sovereign or pound sterling is 
usually taken as $5 when only round num- 
bers are required. 

Q. — Why did sovereigns bring 
only $4.76 in New York in 
1917? 

A. — Because the exchange rate between 
Great Britain and America had fallen at 
the moment to 4.76 dollars, not the usual 
one of 4.86 dollars. The reasons for ex- 
change are too complicated to explain in 
a short answer, but, broadly speaking, 
fluctuations in exchange are due to fluc- 
tuations in the indebtedness of any na- 
tion as against others. 

The war had caused a tremendous trade 
balance in favor of the United States. 
Single sovereigns, in consequence, were 
actually regarded as token money, just 
as twenty separate shillings would be ; 
but if, instead of trying to change single 
sovereigns as a traveler naturally does, 
he took a couple of hundred of them to 
the mint in Washington to be melted up, 
he would get the full value of the gold, 
viz., 4.86 dollars. 

It is this failure to obtain full value 
for gold sovereigns in hotels and shops 
in New York and other American cities 
which has caused many people to think 
that the amount of gold in a sovereign 
was actually worth less than $4.86. 

Q. — Is Great Britain's daily war- 
cost much greater than that of 
France? 

A. — Taking a mean sum based on an 
estimate made in Washington before the 
costs reached the maximum figures that 
we have given elsewhere, Great Britain's 



197 



198 



Questions and Ansivers 



daily cost does not, under the best cir- 
cumstances, fall below $30,000,000 any one 
day. 

France (on the same basis of medium 
figures) is spending $15,369,000 a day. 
The actual figures are greater, beyond 
doubt, but we are trying to give abso- 
lutely bottom calculations. 

Q. — Is not the war-cost small as 
against England's whole 
wealth ? 

A. — Never before in England's history 
has a war (or any other national or in- 
ternational catastrophe) so much as 
scratched her wealth noticeably. But this 
war has almost laid an axe to its very 
basis. A fair estimate of England's 
wealth (the United Kingdom) is $85,000,- 
000,000. England's war cost by March, 
1918, was at least $30,000,000,000 — more 
than 1/3 of her whole national wealth, or 
exactly 1/5 of the total wealth of the en- 
tire British Empire. (On March 7, 1918, 
a new vote of credit was "moved" in the 
House of Commons. It was for 500,000,- 
000 pounds, and it brought the total since 
war began to $33,293,000,000.) 

Q. — What money has Great Brit- 
ain loaned to its Allies? 

A. — Up to August 1. 1917, the total 
was: 

Loans to Dominions $ 730,000,000 

Loans to Allies 5,125,000,000 

Total $5,855,000,000 

Q. — Are all these loans recover- 
able? 

A. — No. Bonar Law, Chancellor of the 
Exchequer, said in 1918 that at that time 
only $1,300,000,000 were recoverable. 

The loans made to Belgium probably 
never will be collected, but will be can- 
celled as a matter of generosity and jus- 
tice both. Serbia, Montenegro and 
Roumania probably never could repay 
their borrowings even if pressed. 

Q. — Has Great Britain borrowed 
much? 

A. — Much of the British financing is 
done by using so-called Treasury bills 
and Exchequer bonds (short-term note 
financing, broadly speaking). Of these, 
not less than $5,000,000,000 were outstand- 
ing in September, 1917. 



By straight loans the following sums 
were obtained: 

Nov., 1914 — zVz per cent... $1,750,000,000 
Nov., 1915 — 4^ per cent... $3,080,000,000 
Nov., 1917 — 5 per cent... $5,000,000,000 



Total $9,830,000,000 

Q. — How much money had Great 
Britain borrowed after three 
years ? 

A. — Great Britain had borrowed, in one 
form and another, $17,875,000,000. 

Q. — Did the war increase Great 
Britain's national debt? 

A. — Yes, it increased the national debt 
enormously. The Chancellor of the Ex- 
chequer, speaking in Parliament, esti- 
mated that at the end of the fiscal year, 
1917-1918 it would "not exceed 28 billions 
709 millions." The national debt of Great 
Britain before the war had been less than 
3 billions 500 millions. 

Q. — How many British war saving 
certificates have been bought? 

A. — Up to January 26, 1918, certificates 
to the face value of $550,000,000 had been 
purchased. This was two years after the 
scheme had been adopted. 

Q. — Has England considered the 
conscription of capital? 

A. — Yes. There has long been a strong 
party in England which urged that not 
only should the income taxes be increased, 
but that the Government should go boldly 
to property owners and take a percentage 
of their capital, to help defray the hor- 
rible expenditure for the war. Even 
Chancellor Bonar Law and Premier Lloyd 
George are understood to be sympathetic 
to the idea. 

The trouble is that the 85 billions of 
values is not held as cash, and it would 
be obviously impossible for a whole na- 
tion to start selling property at the same 
time, to raise money for taxes. To meet 
this difficulty, it has been proposed to col- 
lect this tax in installments spread over 
a number of years, but in that case it be- 
comes substantially just an income tax. 

Q. — What is the income tax in 
Great Britain? 

A. — When the war began, the income 
tax stood at 1 shilling 2 pence ; it was in- 
creased to 2 shillings 6 pence in the pound 



Cost of War {Allies) 



199 



in July, 1915 ; to 3 shillings 6 pence in 
December, 1915 ; and to 5 shillings in 
1916. In addition, there was a super-tax 
of 3 shillings 6 pence in the pound for 
large incomes. 

Q. — At five shillings, does this not 
take away one-quarter of one's 
income? 

A. — Yes. The weight of the 5 shilling 
income tax is, however, made easier to 
those whose incomes do not exceed 
£2,500, as far as the earned part is con- 
cerned. That earned part will now pay 
2 shillings 3 pence to £500 ($2,500) ; 2 
shillings 6 pence to £1,000; 3 shillings to 
£1,500; 3 shillings 8 pence to £2,000; and 
4 shillings 4 pence in the pound when the 
earned income does not exceed £2,500, at 
which figure the super-tax becomes pay- 
able, if the whole income exceeds £3,000. 

And so, also, when an unearned income 
does not exceed £2,000 ($10,000), the in- 
come tax will be 3 shillings to £500; 3 
shillings 6 pence to £1,000; 4 shillings to 
£1,500 ; and 4 shillings 6 pence in the pound 
when the income does not exceed £2,000. 
This relief is due in addition to any other 
relief, or where exemption or abatement 
reduces the taxable amount ; but the re- 
lief must be on account of the claimant's 
own income and his own income only. 

In figuring this, figure 25 cents to the 
shilling, 2 cents to the penny, and $5 to 
the pound, and you will have a close idea 
of the British tax. 

Q. — What proportion of excess 
profits is taken by the British 
Government? 

A. — Originally 50 per cent, it was then 
raised to 60 per cent, and for 1917 was 
to be 80 per cent, calculated to bring the 
Exchequer £180,000,000 ($878,400,000). 

Q. — What were the anticipated 
revenue and expenditure for 
1917-1918? 

A. — Bonar Law expected to get £612,- 
500,000 ($2,980,731,250), an increase^ of 
$190,000,000 only over last year's receipts. 
He was imposing increased taxation, 
which was expected to swell the total to 
$3,096,000,000. The expenditure for the 
year was expected to reach $11,145,000,- 
000. Evidently, therefore, at least £1,651,- 
781,000 ($8,037,000,000) would have to be 
borrowed during the year. The new year 
was entered on with $89,000,000 in the 
Treasury, and over $2,400,000,000 Treas- 
ury Bills outstanding. 



Q. — How much was needed to meet 
interest on the British war- 
debt? 

A. — In his budget speech in May, 1917, 
Bonar Law set aside the sum of £211,500,- 
000 ($1,029,264,750 at normal rate of 
$4.8665 American money to the pound 
sterling) to meet debt charges. Only 
£17,000,000 ($82,730,500) of this gigantic 
sum was for pre-war charges, the rest 
being due entirely to loans raised since 
the war began. Actually, therefore, the 
annual amount which Great Britain has to 
find for the payment of interest on money 
lent the government exceeds her total an- 
nual pre-war revenue and expenditure. 

Q. — What was the exact revenue 
of Great Britain in pre-war 
days and what is it now? 

(in round numbers) 

1912-13 $919,000,000 

1913-14 947,000,000 

1914-15 1,103,000,000 

1915-16 1,658,000,000 

1916-17 2,790,000,000 

1917-18 (est.) 2,980,000,000 

Q. — What was the cause of the big 
jump in 1916? 

A. — The estimated revenue for 1916-17 
was $2,125,000,000, so that actually $665,- 
000,000 more was obtained than was ex- 
pected. This was chiefly due to the 
Excess Profits Tax, which brought in 
$680,000,000, instead of the anticipated 
$375.ooo,ooo, and Income Tax which, ex- 
pected to bring in $750,000,000, actually 
yielded $997,500,000. 

Q. — How has British duty on tea 
increased? 

A. — In August, 1914, it was raised from 
5d. to 8d. per pound. In December, 1915, 
it was raised to is. per pound. The duty 
on coffee since August, 1914, has been in- 
creased to 6d. a pound, the duty on cocoa 
to 4^d. a pound. The duty on sugar 
was found at is. iod. per cwt. when the 
war broke out. It was then advanced to 
9s. 4d., and in 1916 to 14s. To the original 
tobacco duty of 3s. 8d., is. iod. was add- 
ed in December, 1915. A duty of 6d. a 
gallon was placed on motor spirits, and 
some special import duties were imposed 
on what were regarded as luxuries — 
33 T /3 per cent on motor cars, musical in- 
struments, clocks, cinema films and the 
like. The importation of some of these 
things has now been entirely prohibited. 
A duty of 3s. 6d. per 10,000 was levied on 



20O 



Questions and Answers 



imported matches and an excise duty of 
3s. 4d. on locally made matches, with a 
further addition where more than eighty 
matches were found in a box. Every 
tinder box was subject to a duty of 5s. 
The extra duties levied on beer make the 
whole tax 25s. per barrel. (Figure the 
English penny (d.) roughly at 2 cents 
American, and the shilling (s.) roughly 
at 25 cents.) 

Q. — Did Russia raise her costs by 
tax or loan ? 

A. — About half of the money needed 
was raised by means of Treasury bonds, 
many of which were taken up by the 
Allies, among others by Japan. 

At the end of July, 1916, the war lia- 
bilities consisted of: 

Roubles 
9,000,000,000 Treasury bonds. 
($4,630,000,000) 

5,000,000,000 Internal long term bonds. 
($2,573,ooo,ooo) 

7,406,000,000 External long term bonds. 
($3,812,000,000) 



21,406,000,000 roubles, total. 
($11,015,500,000) 

This, however, does not anything like 
represent all her liability at that time, as 
the Czar's Government had arranged for 
credits in London to the extent of 2,000,- 
000,000 roubles ($1,029,200,000) to meet 
liabilities in respect of the foreign pur- 
chase of war material. In addition, the 
Government had issued 4,899,000,000 ($2,- 
498,000,000) worth of paper money since 
the war started. 

The total Russian loans up to the time 
of the revolution have been estimated as 
25 billion dollars. 

Q. — What did France expend for 
the war? 

A. — Figures submitted to the French 
Chamber of Deputies stated that from 
August 1, 1914, to December 31, 1917, 
France had appropriated 87,200,000,000 
francs for war expenses. This sum, com- 
puted at the normal value in American 
money of 19.3 cents to the franc, is $16,- 
829,600,000. 

Q. — How many war loans has 
France raised? 

A. — Only two public loans had been 
raised to April, 1918. The first realized 
15,130,000,000 francs ($2,920,000,000), the 
second 11,360,000,000 francs ($2,192,000,- 



000). Forty per cent of the first loan was 
in cash, and 55 per cent of the second. 

The French Government, like the Brit- 
ish, accepted payment in what was the 
French equivalent of British Consols, viz., 
Rentes. In the first loan this Rentes scrip 
to the value of 4,430,000,000 francs irre- 
deemable 3 per cent, and 24,400,000 francs 
redeemable 3^ per cent was accepted. 

Holders of Rentes were permitted to 
transfer to the war loans on condition that 
they took up a definite proportion of war 
loan stock for cash in addition. The 
Government also accepted various other 
State bonds in payment of war loan 
stock. The reason why the second loan 
was smaller, and more of it in cash, was 
due to the fact that so much of the Rentes 
had been already transferred to the first 
loan. 

Q.— What did the first French 
loan actually realize? 

A. — The first loan realized $2,920,000,- 
000 ; but, as it was issued at 88, the actual 
money obtained was only $2,575,000,000. 

Q. — What financial advances did 
France make to its Allies? 

A. — During a discussion late in Jan- 
uary, 1918, in the Chamber of Deputies, 
over a bill authorizing further advances 
to "Allied and friendly nations," a deputy 
stated that these advances amounted to 
408,000,000 francs ($78,294,000), bringing 
the total advances to 6,421,000,000 francs 
($1,239,000,000), and asked the Govern- 
ment's intention regarding the Russian 
coupons. He said that the French Gov- 
ernment already had paid 2,000,000 francs 
to French holders of Russian bonds, thus 
favoring them over the holders in other 
countries of bonds whose coupons had 
not been paid since the beginning of the 
war. 

Finance Minister Klotz replied that the 
financial actions taken in the name of 
Russia were independent of any changes 
in regime there. The Allies were dis- 
cussing the question of the Russian cou- 
pons. Meanwhile, he said, France would 
pay the February coupons as it had paid 
those falling due in January. 

Q. — How is it that France borrows 
from us, yet lends to her Al- 
lies? 

A. — Neither Great Britain nor France 
has advanced much actual cash to its Al- 
lies. Between them they provided the 
Belgian Government with what it needed 
for out-of-pocket expenses, but practic- 



Cost of War {Allies) 



20I 



ally all the loans were given to pay for 
supplies manufactured in the country ad- 
vancing the money. That is, Italy might 
obtain a large amount of war material 
from Great Britain, but instead of having 
to pay for it, the British Government set- 
tles the bill for her with the British man 
ufacturer. Thus, though Italy is liable for 
the money, and must pay the interest 
thereon, the money itself actually re- 
mains in England all the time. 

It is the same with the loans which the 
United States is granting to the Allies. 
None of the money thus advanced leaves 
the United States, but remains in the 
hands of American manufacturers who 
have filled orders for England, France, 
Italy, Belgium and Russia. 

Q. — What war loans have the Ital- 
ians raised? 

A. — Their fourth was raised in April, 
1917, and realized 3,616,000,000 lire ($697,- 



880,000), of which 2,490,000,000 lire was 
new money. 

Q. — Did Serbia, Roumania and Bel- 
gium spend much per day? 



A. — About $2,968,000 a day between 
them, and most of this, of course, was 
money advanced by the stronger Allies. 



Q. — What is Italy's daily war ex- 
penditure? 

A. — It Is about $4,612,000. 



Q. — Is this greater than that of 
Russia? 

A. — No. Russia's daily expenditure up 
to the time of the revolution in March, 
1917, was $13,000,000. 



COST OF WAR (CENTRAL POWERS) 



Q. — How much is the war costing the paper money required, regardless of 

Germanv dailv? ^inflation, through the Reichsbank, and, 

j j ' in case this proved insufficient, through 

A.— It was said early in 191 7 in a cable the loan banks ; and second, to leave all 

from England that it had been officially arrangements for rectifying the finances 

announced that the daily expenditure of until after the war. 
Germany on the war was $25,000,000. 

It was announced in the Reichstag on Q. — How did Germany's war fi- 
March 16, 1916, that the cost of the last nance plan work? 
months of 1915 was two milliards of , . . . , . , . _ 
marks monthly— that is, $476,400,000. A ~ £ financial expert said in 1918: 
That would make the daily expenditure , *? December, 1917, there were, round- 
just about $15,920,000. The Minister said lv > $1,868,300,000 of the Darlehnskassen 
further that during January and February " o1 : e s outstanding, and the Reichsbank 
the cost had been less ; that in spite of had , $317,000,000 worth of them. The 
the immense shell and gun production, total issues of paper money in Germany 
and increased cost of raw materials, the jncluding Reichsbank notes Imperial 
expenditure in January, 1916, was just Treasury notes, notes of other banks, and, 
about the same as in January, 1915. since established, Darlehnskassen notes 

On the basis of the official American was as follows at different dates : Decem- 

estimates for the three years up to Au- ber 1913, $700,000,000; December 1914, 

gust I, 1917, the daily cost for the Ger- $1,629,000,000; December, 1915, $2,377,- 

man Empire, after America entered the 000,000; December, 1916, $2,912,000,000; 

war, would figure out $18,036,529. December, 1917, $4,783,000,000. The 

Reichsbank's own notes outstanding, $459,- 

Q.— What does the war cost Aus- $00,000 on July 23, 1914. were $2,787,000,- 

4. • tt j m -> 00° ° n December 31, 1917. (These figures 

tna- .Hungary daily:' are a i ittle i arger tnan as they figure in 

A.— The daily cost of the war to Aus- Ge ™ an ™oney.) 

tria-Hungary was closely figured at $8,- , The se notes go out into the hands of 

858 447. tne P u bhc and to a large extent find them- 
selves on deposit with the joint-stock 

Q. — What loans has Germany banks, where they form the base for the 

floated? extension of further credits by the joint- 
stock banks. Hence the deposits of the 

A. — Up to March I, 1918, Germany banking institutions in Germany have 

had floated seven loans, all at 5 per cent, increased to a very large extent, and it is 

The amounts obtained were as follow: — estimated that the total increase since 

First loan $1,120,000,000 the .beginning of the war amounts to the 

Second loan 2275750000 g^^'J £ ah Z ^ 000 ;, 000 > 000 ( a f b?ut 

Third loan 3 040 000 000 $5,ooo,ooo,ooo) We see the same thing 

Fourth loan 2,690000000 ,%w L nJ^ ' °*' and 

Fifth loan 2,875.000,000 ,n other countrie s- 

Sixth loan ,. 3,190,000,000 Q._what was the German Na- 

Seventh loan 3,125,000,000 . • 1 t> 1 t i_ r •> 

tional Bank Law before war? 

Total $18,315,750,000 A.— Under the law before the war the 

Reichsbank could (and still can) create 

Q. — Do Bulgaria and Turkey spend credit balances without any limit other 

much per dav? than financial expediency fixes, but the 

* note issues for public circulation were 

A. — Yes They spend (combined) limited to three times the cash balance 

about $1,325,000. on hand, covered one-third by cash and 

two-thirds by discounted bills falling due 

Q. — What was the German finan- within three months and bearing (except 

cial policy for war? ' n special cases of two-name paper) 

" * three names. The ordinary Government 

A. — A famous British banker said in Treasury bill was not then a legal bill of 

February, 1918, that two decisions were exchange for purposes of covering note 

apparently reached: First, to raise all issues. 

202 



Cost of War (Central Powers) 



203 



Q. — What new German Bank Laws 
were passed during war? 

A. — Immediately upon the outbreak of 
the war, on Aug. 4, 1914, the German law 
was changed in two important particulars 
to permit of the expansion of credit and 
circulation. It was made legal for the 
Reichsbank to accept Treasury bills with 
two official signatures as "bills of ex- 
change." The Government also revived 
by law a system of special "loan banks," 
or Darlehnskassen, used in 1848 and in 
the Franco-Prussian war. These banks 
made loans such as ordinary commercial 
banks are unable to make, a class of 
"dead loans," to individuals, firms, and 
municipalities to the extent of 40 to 85 
per cent of the value of various securi- 
ties offered, in the form of special Gov- 
ernment notes. 

These banks were established for the 
purpose not only of lightening the burden 
of the Reichsbank and the joint-stock 
banks in the necessary credit extensions 
of the emergency, but the notes issued by 
them were by law made receivable at the 
Reichsbank as cash for its necessary one- 
third cash cover in the issuance of its 
own notes. 

Q. — Has war financing not seri- 
ously inflated German cur- 
rency? 

A. — Dr. Havenstein, President of the 
Reichsbank, recently said that the banks 
will be continued for four or five years 
after the war, and will be available for 
any sort of lending on easy terms. He 
said further that when peace comes, the 
holders of war loan will find themselves 
compelled to convert their holdings into 
hard cash for raw materials, new ma- 
chinery, etc., which will throw millions of 
war loan on the market. The responsible 
authorities recognize that there will be in- 
sufficient buyers, and that the fall in the 
price would depreciate all securities, so 
the plan is to form a consortium, con- 
sisting of the Reichsbank, the joint-stock 
banks, and the Darlehnskassen. The 
Darlehnskassen and, to an extent, the 
Reichsbank, will provide the capital for 
the absorption of war loans, and the 
Reichsbank and branches will take up the 
stock as it is offered for sale. The stock 
so absorbed will be gradually redistrib- 
uted over a number of years through the 
Reichsbank and the joint-stock banks. 

Q. — What was Germany's financial 
condition in 191 8? 
A. — It was claimed by British financial 
papers that in January, 1918, the notes 



then in circulation in Germany had passed 
the $4,000,000,000 mark. 
The details were given as follows: 

(round numbers) 

Reichsbank notes $2,800,000,000 

Treasury notes 87,500,000 

Loan notes 1,565,000,000 

Total $4,442,500,000 

These figures, it will be noted, are a lit- 
tle lower than others cited by other cal- 
culators. The financial war statements of 
all the nations lend themselves, of course, 
to all sorts of statements — according to 
whatever one may want to prove. 



Q. — Did the war increase Ger- 
many's governmental ex- 
penses? 

A. — It laid a steadily enlarging burden 
on all the nations, and Germany had to 
carry a constantly growing load. It was 
reported early in 1918 that the ordinary 
receipts and expenditures of the German 
budget for 1918 balance at $1,830,000,000, 
as compared with approximately $1,250,- 
000,000 in the previous year. The increase 
was said to be due mainly to the higher 
amount required for interest on the na- 
tional debt. 

Q. — Can Germany pay her inter- 
nal debts? 

A. — In August, 1917, a German autho- 
rity said that the burden of interest alone 
must inevitably cripple her internal 
economy. The interest then was figured 
as # $1,750,000,000 annually. (U. S. War 
Dictionary) . 

Q. — What classes paid the most 
income in Prussia in 1918? 

A. — The wealthy classes did, as they 
were doing everywhere, in so far as actual 
individual amounts of money were con- 
cerned. But the backbone of taxation for 
income was furnished by the people of 
small incomes. Thus 54 per cent of the 
number of taxpayers came from the peo- 
ple with annual incomes from $225 to 
$750 and the next class (incomes of $750 
to $2,375) furnished 19 per cent of the 
taxpayers. 

Q. — Had the general German in- 
comes increased? 

A. — Not the general incomes, but there 
was a large increase among the trades- 



204 



Questions and Answers 



people and certain business men and in- 
dustrials. It was due, no doubt, to war 
profits, as in the other belligerent coun- 
tries. Thus the increases of Prussia's 
taxpayers paying on incomes of $6,000 to 
$25,000 had jumped by 8 per cent, incomes 
from $25,000 to $125,000 had increased 
27 per cent, those of $125,000 to $250,000 
had increased by 40 per cent, and the 
jump in incomes of more than $250,000 
a year was actually 47 per cent. 

Q. — Are German war taxes falling 
heavily on the small people ? 

A. — The Prussian Kingdom's taxes had 
begun, by 1917, to reach further than 
ever before for the small incomes, while 
increasing for the larger ones. At the 
end of the third year of the war the 
actual number of taxpayers in the income 
classes up to $225 had increased from 
36.7 per cent to 37.5 per cent of the whole. 

If the incomes above $750 are taken it 
is found that while the number of tax- 
payers decreased from 888,000 to 842,000 
— that is, by 5 per cent — the total income 
increased from $1,400,000,000 to $1,900,- 
000,000, or by 7.4 per cent, making an 
increase in average income for this class 
of 13.4 per cent. 

Q. — How did the German people 
stand the war financially? 

A. — The figures are very confusing be- 
cause, in the first place, they were given 
in elaborately "camouflaging" form by 
German authorities and in the second 
place they have been re-shaped and re- 
stated as they passed through the censor- 
ship of Germany's European antagonists. 
We have, however, a fairly reliable indi- 
cation of the internal financial condition 
in a report of the Kingdom of Prussia. 

According to the figures, the year 1916, 
as compared with the year 1914, showed 
a decrease of 2.2 per cent in the number 
of individual taxpayers, and a decrease 
of 5.3 per cent in the number of com- 
panies, etc., paying taxes, the latter due, 
presumably, to the shutting down, for one 
cause or another, of many concerns. On 
the other hand, the total income coming 
under tax had risen from $4,525,000,000 
in 1914 to $4,700,000,000 in 1916, making 
an increase from $605 per capita of popu- 
lation to $625. 

Q. — Did very many Germans be- 
come rich through the war? 

A. — The percentage increases in high 
annual incomes were surprising, but this 



did not mean that the increase by indi- 
viduals was very great. 

The number of so-called "millionaires" 
—that is, people with annual incomes of 
more than 1,000,000 marks ($230,000) — 
rose from twenty-seven in 1896 to ninety- 
one in 1914, and to 134 in 1916 in Prussia 
alone. 

Q. — Did German business increase 
during the war? 

A. — The returns of the Reichsbank for 
January 7, 1918, showed a total clearing 
business of the Reichsbank for 1917 of 
$23,000,000,000, as compared with 16 bil- 
lions in 1916, 14 billions in 1915, 16 bil- 
lions in 1914, and 17 billions in 1913, the 
last complete year of peace. The expla- 
nation given by the Frankfurter Zeitung 
for the increase in 1917 was the issue 
of war loans, combined with increased 
Stock Exchange business and the de- 
creased purchasing power of money. 
Further statistics of the Frankfurter 
Zeitung gave the increase in capital by 
existing companies and the issue of 
shares by new companies as 33 billions 
for the first half-year of 1917 and 70 
billions for the second half, the main 
part of the rise in the second half-year 
being due by the increase in capital of 
37 billions in November by anilin con- 
cerns. 

Q. — Did the Franco-Prussian War 
cost much? 

A. — Comparatively little in money ac- 
tually spent for war. The Treasury De- 
partment's experts figure as follows: 

1870-1871 j£ rance $1,580,000,000 

' ' ( Germany $954,400,000 



Q. — How much did the Franco- 
Prussian War cost per day? 

A. — From the declaration of war to the 
signing of peace, the war lasted exactly 
299 days. For that period (part of which 
saw no fighting at all), the daily cost to 
Germany was $3,182,000, and France's 
daily cost was $5,267,000. 

Q. — Did Turkey get much money 
from Germany? 

A. — A German expert, Emil Zimmer- 
mann, estimated in May, 1917, that Ger- 
many had advanced to Turkey nearly 
3,000,000,000 marks ($714,000,000) up to 
that time. 



Cost of War {Central Powers) 



205 



Q. — How did the Austro-Hun- 
garian State Bank help to fi- 
nance the war? 

A. — The first direct call which was 
made upon the bank was based upon an 
agreement of August 14, 1914. The two 
Governments (Austria and Hungary) 
took up 2,000,000,000 crowns (at normal 
exchange the Austro-Hungarian crown is 
worth $0.2026) against deposit of treas- 
ury bills to the amount of 2,666,000,000 
crowns, redeemable in gold and bearing 
interest at 5 per cent. A second agree- 
ment (October 7, 1914) allowed the 
Governments to borrow not more than 
2,000,000,000 crowns, and a supplementary 
agreement of April 12, 1915, placed a 
further 800,000,000 crowns at their dis- 
posal on the same terms. 

Q. — Did Austria depend heavily on 
the State Bank? 

A. — It did. In the middle of 1915 the 
Governments again had recourse to the 
bank and this made it necessary for the 
directors to make a general decision on 
the whole attitude toward Government 
applications for loans during the war. 
They gave their consent to the Govern- 
ment applications, on conditions that re- 
course should be had to the bank only 
when no other method of obtaining money 
was practicable. 

The various agreements have been 
made at various dates from July 15, 1915, 
to November 24, 1917, under each of 
which the Governments have been au- 
thorized to borrow 1,500,000,000 crowns 
against promissory notes, the definite al- 
location of which is to take place not 
later than six months after the conclusion 
of peace. The amount actually borrowed 
in virtue of these agreements by Decem- 
ber 7, 191 7, was 13,200,000,000 crowns. 

Q. — Did Austria ever make any re- 
ports as to internal finances? 

A. — The first statement of the Austro- 
Hungarian State Bank since the outbreak 
of the war was made on December 7, 
1917. It was not complete, but it showed 
the gold reserve at that date to be $35,- 
000,000, as against $257,800,000 at the end 
of July, 1914, and note circulation to be 
$7,375,000,000, as against $433,500,000. 
This gold reserve was the smallest of any 
European state bank except those* of Nor- 
way and Denmark. The note circulation 
was $2,900,000,000 larger than that of any 
other bank except the Bank of Russia. 



Q. — Did Germany attempt to reim- 
burse herself for war costs 
from the countries she con- 
quered? 

A. — Responsible German officials have 
been quoted as declaring that only 
through war indemnities could the Ger- 
man Government pay the vast costs of 
the struggle. Certainly the acts of the 
military commanders have been in accord 
with this principle. On no pretext save 
that of the power to demand it, Belgian 
and French cities were levied upon for 
huge sums under penalty of destruction. 

M. Andre. Cheradome made a list early 
in 1918 of "booty" of all kinds seized by 
the Germans : 

(a) "Hitman Material." The millions 
of Allied subjects made to labor for Ger- 
many. 

(b) War Material. Everything from 
guns and munitions to thousands of miles 
of railways. 

(c) Foodstuffs. Everywhere horses, 
cattle and food materials have been 
seized. 

(d) Raw Materials. Mines, minerals 
and textile materials have been taken over 
in all occupied territories. In northern 
France alone the invaders secured $110,- 
000,000 worth of wool. Without the coal 
and iron they got in France they could 
not have continued the war. 

(e) Industrial Plants. Motors, ma- 
chines, mills and looms have been sys- 
tematically removed and sent back to 
Germany. 

(f) Furniture. There has been a reg- 
ular business of shipping back stolen 
household goods in vast quantities. 

(g) Works of Art. Priceless art 
treasures has been taken from museums, 
churches, and private homes. 

(h) War Levies. Requisitions, fines, 
taxes and forced loans have run into 
many millions of dollars. 

(i) Coin, Jewels and Securities. All 
sorts of valuables have been removed by 
order from banks, and private safes. All 
the deposits of Allied subjects in Belgian 
banks, to the amount of $120,000,000, were 
thus seized as plunder. 

This total, impossible to estimate, must 
run up to several billion dollars — of course 
entirely apart from the irresponsible plun- 
dering of individual soldiers and officers. 

In addition, the treaty signed with the 
Bolsheviki government in the summer of 
1918 provided that Russia should pay 
Germany six billion marks (about $1,500,- 
000,000). 



GERMANY (INDUSTRIAL STRUCTURE) 



Q. — What was the internal con- 
dition of Germany in 191 8? 

A. — The iron-clad censorship of the 
German Government has prevented us 
from knowing as exactly as we should 
like, and individual reports of travelers 
are varying or conflicting. Some things, 
however, are certain. The nation was 
dangerously divided in its sentiment as 
to the war. The tremendous traffic from 
east to west and north to south had put 
the country's railroads in bad condition, 
both as to rolling stock and roadbed. 
There was practically no travel except 
for government purposes, a prohibitive 
tax being placed upon passenger tickets 
for all civilians. No freight or express 
was accepted except for the Government's 
use against the enemy. Many raw mate- 
rials, particularly cotton, were lacking, 
and people were dying of disease and 
starvation. 

The Neue Wiener Journal, of Vienna, 
stated on December 15, 1917, that in the 
Austrian capital during 1917, 45,000 peo- 
ple died of all diseases. In comparison, 
to this there were but 24,000 births. Of 
the total number of deaths 12,000 were 
caused by tuberculosis, a disease which 
was steadily increasing because of the 
poor food conditions. 

Q. — Just how does all Germany 
compare in size with us? 

A. — In size all Germany is not so big 
as Texas. In fact, Germany could be 
put into Texas, and there still would be 
enough of Texas unoccupied to accom- 
modate New York and New Jersey, or 
Arkansas and Rhode Island, or all of 
Illinois except a tiny edge. 

Or if you want to figure it another way, 
the United States could take in fifteen 
German Empires. 

Q. — How does German man-power 
compare with American? 

A. — Germany has about 65 per cent of 
the population we have. (Germany had 
65 million people in 1910, and we had an 
estimated population of 102 million in 
1917.) But, comparing the areas of the 
two countries, the German population is 
proportionately 14% times bigger than 
ours — or, rather, if the United States were 
as densely populated, instead of having 
102 millions we would have 950 millions, 
or almost a billion people ! 



Q. — What was the chief feature of 
German advance before the 
war? 

A. — The systematic and wholesale ap- 
plication of scientific research to every 
industrial operation from coal mining to 
toy-making. Since the Franco-Prussian 
War, Germany has made industrial science 
(or scientific industry) the most impor- 
tant part of her whole structure. For 
more than a generation it has not been 
the "shop-foreman" or the "superintend- 
ent" who played the big part in her in- 
dustrial establishments. It has been the 
chemist, the analyst, the "Herr Profes- 
sor" (of everything from mathematics to 
astronomy), whose ability guided the great 
factories and the great operations of com- 
merce. 

Q. — With whom did Germany do 
the biggest business during 
peace? 

A. — In 1913 and 1912 she did her big- 
gest all-round business, counting both ex- 
ports and imports, with the United States 
and Russia. Great Britain was a close 
third. Other countries with which she 
did a major business were France, Italy, 
Holland, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, Ar- 
gentina, British India, Australia, Brazil, 
and Chile. Her trade with British West 
Africa and Egypt had been very large in 
1912, but it had fallen away astonishingly 
in 1913. 

Q. — What does Germany export 
mostly ? 

A. — Her exports in 1913 were, in the 
order of their value: machinery, iron 
manufactures, coal, cotton goods, wool- 
lens, sugar (beet), paper and paper goods, 
furs, silk goods, coke, aniline dyes, rye, 
clothing, copper goods, leather goods, 
toys, wheat, books, rails and sleepers, in- 
digo, chinaware, electric lamps and tele- 
graph cable. 

Q. — What does Germany need to 
import? 

A. — In 1913 she imported raw cotton, 
wheat, raw wool, barley, copper, skins and 
hfdes, iron ore, coffee, coal, eggs, furs, 
nitrate, raw silk, bran, rubber, lard, to- 
bacco, linseed, butter, oil-cake, horses, 
rice, maize and rye. 



206 



X 



Germany (Industrial Structure) 



207 



Q. — Why do we hear so much of 
the dye industry? 

A. — Partly because dyes are one of the 
very big factors of commerce. The an- 
cient city of Tyre, mentioned in the Bible 
for its grandeur, owed much of its wealth 
to its dye — the still famous Tyrian pur- 
ple, which was obtained from a sea-slug. 
There is hardly an article of manufacture 
that does not need at least a little color 
on it somewhere ; and the huge textile in- 
dustries depend on coloring matter as 
much as they do on the original raw 
materials of wool and cotton. It is true 
that if the world came to a sharp pinch, 
we could use textiles as they come from 
the looms — but a great part of the world's 
beauty and its industrial art would van- 
ish with the vanishing of dyes. 

Q. — Is the dye industry vital to 
Germany's wealth? 

A. — No. From the mere financial point 
of view, her artificial dye industry ranks 
far below her production of machinery, 
iron and iron goods, cotton, woollen, paper 
and silk goods, etc., as expressed in values 
of exports. In 1913 the total value of ex- 
ported dyes was less than 35 millions. 

Q. — What, then, was the over- 
whelming importance of the 
dye industry? 

A. — To the rest of the world its great 
importance was in the fact that the world 
had permitted itself to depend on the Ger- 
man dyes. When these were cut off sud- 
denly by war, their lack was felt acutely. 
Even though a given industry might need 
only a very small quantity, it was an ab- 
solute necessity that could not be im- 
mediately supplied from other sources. 
To Germany herself, the industry repre- 
sented one that earned great profits on a 
small bulk of material. Far more im- 
portant, however, was the fact that it was 
one of the corner-stones in her vast sys- 
tem of by-product utilization. 

Q. — What is a by-product? 

t A. — It is a product produced "on the 
side" incidentally. Thus saw-dust is a 
by-product. Dripping is a by-product. 
Until comparatively recent time, the in- 
numerable by-products of industries were 
used only as they came. In many, per- 
haps most cases they were allowed to go 
to waste. Even those who saved by- 
products zealously did not go beyond that 
to expand them. They remained "on the 
side." To-day, however, we perceive that 
by-products are monumental parts of 
modern industry and in coming years even 



the greatest will have to be buttressed all 
around with systems of intense by-prod- 
uct utilization. 

Q. — Of what are dyes a by-prod- 
uct? 

A. — Of coal-tar — and here we find a 
great fundamental source of modern Ger- 
many's industrial strength. One of the 
worst wastefulnesses in world industry is 
in burning coal. Of all ways of using 
coal, the production of coke in the iron 
and steel industry is one of leading im- 
portance. Thus, almost one-seventh of 
America's coal is made into coke ; but the 
American method of steel-making, while 
excellent for its specific purpose, wastes 
at least two-thirds of this coke without 
gaining by-products. The German method 
not only saves but intensifies the produc- 
tion of the coal by-products. Dye is only 
one of them. An enormous variety of 
drugs (aspirin, saccharin and dozens 
more), industrial chemicals and import- 
ant basic material for high explosives 
come from the same source. 

Q. — Did Germany have natural 
sources of dyes ? 

A. — Germany had within her boundaries 
practically no natural sources of dyes. 
Indigo, the leading blue dye of the world, 
was made from a plant raised in India. 
Red came largely from the cochineal in- 
sect of Mexico and Africa. The other 
colors came from ores, earths and plants 
scattered over the world. 

Q. — What was the first great Ger- 
man dye discovery? 

A. — It was hardly a discovery, unless 
you apply the word "discovery" to a work 
of almost twenty years of patient, in- 
cessant search for a certain method to 
do a certain thing. The first big German 
dye-discovery or invention was the way 
to make indigo — that is, to make "syn- 
thetically" a dye that, up to that time, 
had been of purely vegetable origin. One 
of the big German industrial firms in the 
southern part of Germany where indus- 
try and technical science first began their 
partnership, had kept not one, but a whole 
corps of chemists at work on the prob- 
lem before it was solved. It is recorded 
that the cost to that concern was $3,750,- 
000 before the way was found ; but it 
paid. The first man to produce a syn- 
thetic indigo was Professor von Bayer ; 
but the cost of the product by his proc- 
ess was pretty high, and it was not until 
other processes were perfected that the 
dye industry sprang into a magnitude 
that amazed Germany. 



208 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — How is synthetic indigo made? 

A. — The starting point is naphthalene. 
After intricate processes, there is pro- 
duced a substance known as indigotine. 
This product again must pass through 
long chemical processes before the paste 
or powder is obtained for the market. 

Q. — Where did natural indigo come 
from? 
A. — England, through her ownership of 
India, had a practical monopoly of the 
world's supply of this blue, for almost all 
of it came from immense British plan- 
tations in the Indian province of Bengal. 
In the early part of the nineteenth cen- 
tury the term "indigo planter" was 
synonymous with "nabob." The British 
planters in one district alone (North Be- 
har) drew from this plant incomes that 
aggregated $5,000,000 a year in a coun- 
try where the laborers' monthly wages 
were then counted actually by pennies. 
The area under cultivation throughout 
Bengal was enormous, and, as the supply 
of labor was equally unlimited, a golden 
flood poured in on the planters and into 
the United Kingdom. To-day the indigo 
fields have shrunk to 380,000 acres, and 
the income is only $1,950,000 for all In- 
dia — a tiny bit more than $5 an acre. 

Q. — What is natural indigo? 

A. — It is a plant that grows from 3 
to 5 feet high, doing best in India and 
Java. Its name is Indigofera Sumatrana. 
It contains the coloring matter, which is 
made into the blue dye known as "indigo," 
and it furnishes two crops a year. 

Q. — What are the chief natural 
dyes? 

A. — Besides indigo, there is the madder 
root, making a red ; the logwood tree of 
the American tropics, which produces a 
reddish color that in turn gives us black, 
dark gray, blues, purples and greens when 
employed with divers chemicals ; fustic, 
from a tropical mulberry that gives yel- 
low; cochineal, from a tiny insect found 
on cactus, that gives the richest crimsons 
and scarlets we know ; mineral earths, 
which produce chrome yellow, Prussian 
blue, manganese brown, iron buff, ochre, 
etc. 

Q. — What other dyes have Ger- 
mans discovered? 

A. — The most notable was alizarin red, 
formerly made from the madder root. 
Two German chemists made it from coal- 
tar in 1869. This date is of historical in- 
terest, for it was the first instance of the 



artificial production of a vegetable dye- 
stuff. It was an Englishman, however, 
Sir W. H. Perkins, who prepared the first 
aniline dye in 1856. He produced a 
mauve coloring matter, but this was a 
quite new product and did not replace any 
vegetable dye. It is interesting to know 
that the bright red trousers which early 
in the war made the French so conspicu- 
ous a target for German bullets, could 
no longer be made, as the alizarin dye 
which was used for them was a German 
monopoly. Before the Germans succeed- 
ed in making it, the dye was a French 
monopoly, but since then the cultivation 
of the madder root in France has ceased 
entirely. 

Q. — Has Germany accumulated 
great stores of dyestuffs? 

A. — The British textile journals appear 
to doubt it, and it is difficult to know 
the actual position. The former United 
States Consul at Breslau informed a meet- 
ing of the Philadelphia hosiery manufac- 
turers that dyestuffs were one of three 
commodities which were being held in 
surplus in Germany. The others were 
sulphuric acid and Portland cement. 

We must remember that the manufac- 
ture of explosives is a part of the coal- 
tar industries of Germany, and that in 
their thrift they probably are missing no 
opportunity for storing by-products. 

Q. — Did not the "Deutschland" 
bring us dye during war? 

A. — Yes. The submarine freight vessel 
Deutschland brought about 700 tons — an 
insignificant amount as compared with our 
annual consumption of about 35,000 tons, 
but an eagerly welcomed shipment because 
of the intense stringency in dyes from 
which America was then suffering. The 
price paid was so high that it is said the 
whole cost of the Deutschland was de- 
frayed by the profit made from this one 
trip. 

Q. — Did natural indigo get a mar- 
ket again when war occurred? 

A. — Apparently it did not recover very 
much of a place. It was reported in 
March, 1918, that the natural indigo stock 
taken over by the British Government at 
the beginning of war had been sold ; and 
the figures showed that the total for the 
three years of war had been only 267 
tons, which cost the government $1,760,- 
000. It was taken over because it had been 



Germany (Industrial Structure) 



209 



feared that, owing to the inevitable short- 
age of synthetic indigo, the natural indigo 
might get into the hands of a small group. 

I One hundred tons were sold to the French 
Government, and the remainder gradually 
disposed of to the domestic trade, both 
for home consumption and for export. 
The accounts show a profit of $17,300. 

Q. — Did the English make syn- 
thetic indigo? 

A. — The production of synthetic dye- 
stuffs in Great Britain was reported in 
1918 as three times as large as before 
the war, so that prices dropped in 1917. 

Q. — Has Germany increased her 
coal mining? 

A. — The coal production of the coun- 
try — including lignite — rose from 76,200,- 
000 tons in 1887 to 259,400,000 tons in 
1912. The gain of 240 per cent is equaled 
by no other country except the United 
States. 

Q. — Did Germany aid her steel 

manufacturers ? 

A. — The steel industry, by sheer virtue 
of its overwhelming, absolutely vital, ne- 
cessity to the empire at war, became an 
object of governmental solicitude as soon 
as the struggle began. It does not appear 
that any particular laws were passed to 
grant government funds to the industry 
or otherwise to give official financial as- 
sistance ; but the huge government orders 
had the same effect. 

Just what laws were passed, or what 
regulations were made, to regulate the 
relations between the steel industries and 
the public is not clear. So far as labor 
is concerned, it is known that in the first 
three years of the war the German iron 
and steel industry subscribed about 350 
millions of marks ($83,000,000) to relief 
work. 

Q. — Have steel-workers' wages ad- 
vanced? 

A. — That wages have been advanced 
heavily is known. Government action in 
regard to wages, which affected many in- 
dustries, appears to have affected the steel 
industry most heavily, perhaps because 
of the big number of men they employed. 
The steel manufacturers have expressed 
the view several times at conferences that 
wages had advanced to a point where they 
would handicap Germany's price-compe- 
tition with other nations after war. On 
the other hand, the steel-makers' profits 



have been enormous (as in every country), 
and, in addition, the war-profits tax has 
been lighter than it has been in Great 
Britain. 

Q. — Has Germany built more rail- 
roads than other nations? 

A. — Not in mileage, as compared with 
the United States, but in proportion she 
did nearly what we did from 1890 to 1910. 
In that period we increased our railroad 
mileage 44 per cent, and Germany in- 
creased her mileage 42 per cent. 

Q. — What does Germany save by 
her economies and scientific 
thrift? 

A. — One could only guess. Not even 
the German statisticians, meticulous as 
they_ are, have ventured to attempt any 
specific figures. But we know, in large 
figures, how coal and by-products are 
wasted by the other large industrial na- 
tions, and we know that a large percent- 
age of such waste has been eliminated in 
Germany. This alone enables us to make 
a large general estimate that the German 
industrial economies amount to probably 
more than a thousand million dollars a 
year. Lord Haldane once said, in a speech 
on England's technical needs, that if 
English technicians would devote them- 
selves to economies similar to the Ger- 
man, their work would save the United 
Kingdom at least 2 l /> billions of dollars a 
year — and Lord Haldane is not an ordi- 
nary orator, but a speaker of scientific 
precision. 

Q. — How do the Germans keep 
their economical processes se- 
cret? 

A. — They do not — that is the most ex- 
traordinary part of the story of their 
competition with other nations. Of 
course, they have thousands on thousands 
of trade-secrets — patents, etc., like the rest 
of us. But their big industrial econo- 
mies, such as the utilizations of coal and 
coke, the extraction of every possible by- 
product, the attainment of the utmost val- 
ues from ore, etc., are not secrets at all. 
The whole world knows exactly what they 
are, or almost exactly. In fact, every 
technical expert in the world has for years 
subscribed, as a matter of course, to Ger- 
man technical publications if he meant 
seriously to keep himself posted thor- 
oughly in his own field. The German 
and the French technical publications have 
run a close race in excellence for many 
years. A great part of the world's knowl- 



2IO 



Questions and Answers 



edge would be non-existent except for 
them. Indeed, a big part of the scientific 
news that comes to the English and Amer- 
ican public is based on previous publi- 
cations in the technical press of these two 
nations. 

Q. — Then why did other nations 
not use these economies ? 

A. — For very many reasons. One was 
the human opposition to great and sud- 
den changes. Another was the fact that 
the German industries, being largely new, 
were started right, while the industries 
of older nations were reared on older 
foundations — and it was no light task 
to reform, remodel or perhaps destroy and 
reconstruct these mammoth industrial 
organizations and plants. For instance, 
our steel industry is based on a method 
entirely different from that of the Ger- 
mans. It is true that by their method 
they get not only steel, but they get coke 
and all its innumerable by-products from 
explosives to saccharine. But to rebuild 
our enormous steel industry would entail 
such huge losses that all the profits to be 
made could not repay them for many, 
many years. Naturally, business men do 
not feel like undertaking such tasks, but 
prefer to go on as they are. The war, 
however, has made some of the very 
great changes actually inevitable, and it 
is a cheering thing to know that at least 
part of the American billions is going 
into the construction of just such indus- 
trial plants as Germany has. 

Q. — Did German ammunition man- 
ufacturers profit or lose during 
war? 

A. — The Kxupp company reported for 
the fiscal year 1917 gross profits of $28,- 
725,000, against $28,340,000 in 1916, and 
$32,065,000 in 1915. Net profit was $io,- 
245,000, against $12,415)000 and $21,615,- 
000 in the two preceding years, and the 
dividend 10 per cent, against 12 in the 
three preceding years, and 14 in 1913. 
The trebling of tax payments since 191 5 
caused the heavy drop in net receipts. 

Q. — Are the Krupp works near 
the Rhine? 

A. — Yes. The city of Essen, which is 
largely Krupp, is on the Rhine toward the 
Dutch border. The Rhine-Ruhr district, 
where this city is situated, is one of the 
world's most remarkable manufacturing 
districts. Within a few miles of each 
other are the large cities of Essen (with 
the Krupp gun works), Elberfield-Bar- 



men 



men, Diisseldorf, Duisburg, Dortmund, 
Remscheid and Mulheim. While iron is 
the principal industry, scarcely anything 
can be named which is not made within 
this twenty-five mile radius. 

Q. — What are Germany's other in- 
dustrial centers? 

A. — The other great manufacturing dis- 
tricts are in Bavaria, which is famous for 
its toys, and Saxony for its iron furnaces. 
The finest coal fields are in Lorraine, 
along the river Ruhr, and in Silesia. 

Q. — How and when did Germany 
become an iron producer? 

A. — She first became powerful as a fac- 
tor in the iron industry by her applica- 
tion of new and revolutionary principles 
to the smelting ovens. At the same time 
she so improved her capacity that instead 
of exporting iron ore she had to buy it. 

The excess of iron ore exports of more 
than 700,000 tons for 1887 was converted 
by 1912 into an excess of imports by 
nearly 10,000,000 tons. During the same 
period pig-iron production rose from 
4,024,000 to 17,853,000 tons. From 1886 
to 1910, Germany increased its steel pro- 
duction 1,335 P er cent, the United States 
910 per cent and England 154 per cent. 

Q. — Did the Germans find supplies 
in Northern France worth 
$2,000,000,000? 

A. — It is impossible to tell. That is the 
figure the Germans published. Whether 
it is correct or not has not been stated by 
the Belgian and French authorities. It is 
admitted that vast stores of cotton and 
woollen goods, raw cotton and wool, and 
so forth, were left undestroyed in the 
hasty retirement to the Marne, in the great 
industrial districts about Lille. 

Q. — Have the Germans found sub- 
stitutes for wool and cotton? 

A. — They claim to have done so. Ap- 
parently, they must be using something, 
as all supplies of cotton they can get from 
Asia Minor would certainly be used in 
the making of explosives, and although 
they will, no doubt, have obtained consid- 
erable quantities of wool from Bulgaria 
and Turkey, these countries could have 
sent them only a minimum of the amount 
of wool they formerly obtained from 
abroad. 

One plant from which a fiber is ob- 
tained, which is being used by spinners 
and weavers in Germany instead of cot- 



Germany (Industrial Structure) 



211 



ton, wool and jute, is called the typha, 
and is a sort of cat-tail that grows ex- 
tensively in marshes. The 1916 crop was 
estimated as high as six million tons, and 
the yield of the finished product is 10 
per cent of this. Leading German mer- 
chants and bankers have subscribed capi- 
tal for the manufacture of the new cloth. 
One favorable quality of the typha is that 
it flourishes on land too poor for the 
growing of cereal crops. It can be har- 
vested from Tune until the frosts come. 

Q. — Could an Australian wool em- 
bargo strangle the German 
textile industry? 

A. — Plenty of wool is obtainable from 
other countries. Even merino can be got 
from Uruguay in large quantities. The 
following list of the wool production of 
the countries then neutral was prepared 
by American experts, and published in 
Boston in 1914: 

Europe — Lbs. 

Spain 52,000,000 

Greece 14,000,000 

Asia — 

China 50,000,000 

Persia 12,000,000 

America — 

United States 296,000,000 

Mexico 7,000,000 

Argentine 326,000,000 

Uruguay 157,000,000 

Chile 29,000,000 

Peru 10,000,000 

Central America and 

Brazil 2,000,000 

Total 955,000,000 

The Central Powers, Bulgaria and Tur- 
key, together produce 248,000,000 lbs. The 
Australian production in 1914-15 was 642,- 
000,000 lbs. 

Q. — Can the Germans really make 
synthetic rubber? 

A. — It is not impossible. Every chem- 
ist knows that synthetic rubber can be 
made. The chief trouble about it is that 
it costs more than natural rubber. In 
Germany's war-emergency, that objection 
may have become minor. 

Rubber is merely the sap of a certain 
kind of tree. One way known to make 
synthetic rubber is from starch, best ob- 
tained from potatoes, but it requires a 
Jot. 

An annual production of 10,000,000 
pounds of rubber might require 500,000,- 
000 pounds of potatoes. The starch is 



converted into acetone and butyl alcohol. 
A process known to have been at least 
partially developed by a German company 
is based on the use of acetone. This is 
obtainable from calcium carbide, which 
is very cheap, indeed. 

Q. — When did Germany become a 
big machinery maker? 

A. — She began to make strides about 
1882. The number of persons employed 
in the machine industry increased 229 per 
cent from 1882 till 1907, and more than 
100 per cent was recorded in mining and 
smelting, earths and stone, chemicals, 
paper, printing, and building. From 1895- 
1907 only four industries — textiles, wood- 
working, foods and beverages, and print- 
ing — failed to increase their power more 
than 100 per cent, while the building trade 
gained 308 and machinery 557 per cent, 
and other industries between 100 and 200 
per cent. 

Q. — Is it true that Germany has no 
real seaports? 

A. — She has no great port directly on 
the sea. Hamburg (with maritime busi- 
ness ranking next only to New York, 
Liverpool and London) and Bremen, with 
their outlying stations of Wilhelmshaven, 
Bremerhaven and Cuxhaven, are the only 
ports west of the peninsula of Schleswig- 
Holstein, and so accessible to large trans- 
atlantic traffic, and these are both some 
distance from the sea, Hamburg being on 
the river Elbe and Bremen on the river 
Weser. 

Q. — Can Germany not reach the 
sea through the Rhine? 

A. — To use her great river, the Rhine, 
Germany must go through Holland 
(where the name changes to the Waal) 
to reach the North Sea. Much of her 
shipping is done through the foreign ports 
of Antwerp and Amsterdam. 

But where nature has denied them, the 
Germans have supplied the want by in- 
genuity. The Rhine has been dredged 
one hundred and fifty miles from its 
mouth for navigation by vessels of fair 
sea-going capacity. The whole of Ger- 
many is cut by a network of canals, the 
most famous of which is the Kaiser Wil- 
helm Canal from Kiel on the Baltic to 
Brunsbiittel at the mouth of the Elbe on 
the North Sea. 

Q. — How did Germany's marine 
grow? 

A. — In the 25 years from 1888 to 1913, 
Germany's merchant marine grew from 



212 



Questions and Anstuers 



470,000 net registered tonnage to 2,655,- 
000. Her import trade grew from 740 
million (dollars) to 2 billion 610 million, 
and her exports grew from 747 million 
to 2 biilion 165 million. Germany's total 
foreign trade gained 214 per cent, against 
173 per cen t gained by the United States, 
113 per cent by Great Britain, and 98 per 
cent by France. 

Q. — Was the German marine en- 
tirely prostrated by the war? 

A. — Practically so. There remained, 
however, a pretty lively sea-trade through 
the Baltic with Sweden, and the war- 
profits of the ships so engaged were high. 
Thus, at an auction sale in Rostock, a 
German Baltic port, a steamship was sold 
in 1917 for $637,500. Its cost when built 
in 1908 had been $122,500. Its earnings 
during 1912 had been 12 per cent, and 
during 1913 14 per cent. In 1914 it earned 
nothing. In 1915 it earned 5 per cent. 
In 1916 its earnings were 60 per cent. 

Q. — Did the Germans recover their 
merchant vessels in Antwerp? 

A. — Yes. When the war began, 37 Ger- 
man vessels were lying in Antwerp, and, 
of course, could not get out. It has been 
one of the mysteries of the war why 
either the Belgians or the British did not 
remove these ships. It may be that they 
delayed because of possible complications 
with Holland, since to send the ships to 
England would have made necessary pas- 
sage through the Dutch-controlled mouth 
of the Scheldt. At any rate, the ships 
were left in Antwerp, and when the Ger- 
mans captured the city they thus recap- 
tured their ships. 

Q. — Are the German cities as large 
as ours? 

A. — Germany has no cities as large as 
New York and Chicago in population, 
but Berlin, with 2 millions, has a popula- 
tion exceeded in America only by those 
two big cities. Of cities with more than 
300,000 people, we have 18, while Ger- 
many has 11. Of cities with less than 
300,000 and more than 100,000, we have 
46, against Germany's 31. When it comes 
to cities next in rank of more than 50,- 
000, we have 51 against Germany's 38. 

Q. — What are the big cities of Ger- 
many? 

A. — Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, Leipzig, 
Dresden, Cologne, Breslau, Frankfort, 



Diisseldorf, Nuremberg, Charlottenburg 
and Hanover are the cities with more than 
300,000 people. 

Q. — Are most of the big cities in 
Prussia? 

A. — Of the 12 largest cities, 7 are 
in Prussia. The others are in Saxony 
and Bavaria. Of the whole list of Ger- 
man cities ranking over 50,000, Prussia has 
53 as against 2> 2 m the rest of Germany. 

Q. — Did Germany get oil from 
Roumania? 

A. — In the months of September to 
December, 1916, German armies conquered 
a part of Roumania, and occupied the city 
of Ploechti in the Prahova Valley, the 
center of one of the richest oil-fields in 
Europe. The oil-wells, however, were 
burned, and the oil-reservoirs destroyed. 
From time to time neutral newspapers 
have reported the restoration of the Rou- 
manian oil industry to normal conditions. 

Q. — How much oil might Germany 
get from Roumania's wells? 

A. — In 1913 Roumania exported pe- 
troleum and so forth, to the value of 26 
million dollars. It is known, however, 
that while some of the wells were worked 
with thorough science and with the best 
of modern machinery, a large part of 
the possible oil-territory remained unde- 
veloped or practically so. 

Q. — How much oil might Germany 
get from Batoum and the other 
Black Sea regions? 

A. — The Baku district alone produced 7 
million tons of oil in 1915, the last year 
for which there have been accurate fig- 



Q. — Has Germany much forest 
land? 

A. — Germany has an amazing area of 
forest land, considering the density of 
her population. The whole forest area 
is reckoned at 34J/2 million acres, divided 
into government forests, communal for- 
ests, private forests and forests maintained 
by societies. It is a tiny amount com- 
pared with the 550 million acres of Amer- 
ican forest ; but Germany manages to get 
a big income from her small area, to cut 
it freely and still conserve it and even im- 
prove it. Intensive forestry is the secret. 



Germany (Industrial Structure) 



213 



Q. — Did Germany buy more from 
us than she sold? 

A. — No. Our sales to Germany ranged 
annually about 125 per cent of our pur- 
chases. A large proportion of our sales 
were supplies indispensable or at least 
highly important to Germany, such as cot- 
ton, while our purchases were largely 
goods that we could get from other 
sources or produce ourselves. 

Q. — Whose trade is most important 
to Germany? 

A. — As a customer, Great Britain was 
Germany's most valuable field for Ger- 
man exports. In 1913 Germany sold goods 
to the value of nearly 343 million dollars, 
which was far beyond the next best cus- 
tomer, Autsria-Hungary, whose purchases 
from Germany that year were 263 mil- 
lions. In addition, Germany sent more 
than 100 millions' worth of exports to 
Australia, Canada and the other British 
possessions. 

Q. — What did Great Britain buy 
most of? 

A. — Beet sugar. German exports of 
this to the United Kingdom were more 
than 50 million dollars in 1913. Next in 
value were cotton goods and iron and 
steel manufactures each worth nearly 37 
millions. 

Q. — What did Germany buy mostly 
from England? 

A. — Cottons and woollens and yarn lead 
the list with nearly 64 million dollars in 
1913. Coal and coke follow with 25 mil- 
lion dollars' worth. 

Q. — How much did we buy? 

A. — German exports to the United 
States in 1913 were 177 million dollars' 
worth. 

Q. — Are German imports under 
Government control? 

A. — Mr. James W. Gerard says that 
shortly after the commencement of the 
war a great institution was formed called 
the Central Einkauf Gesellschaft (Cen- 
tral Importing Company). If a German 
manufacturer wishes to buy raw material 



for his factory he must purchase it 
through this board, which pools the orders 
and buys in bulk. The idea is to keep 
this enormously powerful agency after 
the war — not only to purchase necessary 
goods abroad at lower prices, but to pro- 
hibit the buying of foreign articles in 
most cases so that the people must 
patronize home industries. 

Q. — Have many Germans emi- 
grated lately? 

A. — Hardly any. The flood of German 
emigration, very great at one time, 
stopped with extraordinary abruptness. 
In the last few years it has fallen away 
to almost nothing, and even the small 
emigration that there was showed a steady 
diminution annually. In 1913, the year 
before the war, only 26,000 people emi- 
grated from all Germany. 

Q. — Where did most of the emi- 
grants go from? 

A. — The largest number went from 
Prussia, which lost 13,000 people. Ba- 
varia lost only 2,000. 

Q. — When did German emigration 
Hecrease? 

A.— In the decade 1881-90, there were 
1,342,000 German emigrants, as against a 
total birth excess of 5,500,000; in the fol- 
lowing decade there were still 528,000 emi- 
grants to 7,300,000 net births ; but in the 
decade 1901-10, when the birth excess rose 
to 8,670,000 the number of emigrants sank 
to 220,000, or 22,000 a year. 

Q. — Was Germany always an in- 
dustrial country? 

A. — No. Within the memory of living 
men, the German States were mainly agri- 
cultural. "Even during the middle of the 
nineteenth century," says Professor 
Schapiro in his "Modern and Contem- 
poraneous European History," "two gen- 
erations after the industrial revolution had 
taken place in England, Germany was still 
largely a 'peasant land,' as only 30 per 
cent of her population then lived in towns 
of over 2,000. Few factories existed; 
hence there was practically no export of 
manufactured articles. . . . Her soil was 
generally poor, her harbors few, and her 
deposits of coal and iron were so inferior 
in quality that little mining was done." 



GERMANY (POLITICAL STRUCTURE) 



q —What is the form of the Ger- 
man Imperial Government? 

A. — In principle and written law it h a 
union of all the States of Germany under 
an Imperial constitutional government. 
Thus its theory has elements of both 
British and American governmental struc- 
ture. It is a Federal union of sovereign 
States, and these States are represented in 
the Federal Council (Bundesrath) of the 
Empire. Its ruling head is a hereditary 
monarch, and its actual representative of 
executive government before the national 
Parliament (Reichstag) is a Prime Min- 
ister (Imperial Chancellor) appointed by 
the Crown. Its Parliament has two 
houses. But in practice these points of 
resemblance vanish. Mr. Gerard remarks : 
"If the industrial populations had their 
fair share of representation in the 
Reichstag, they might perhaps even con- 
trol that body. But . . . the Reichstag 
has only the power of public opinion, and 
the Germany of to-day is ruled by officials 
appointed from above downwards." 

Q. — What makes Germany's prac- 
tice differ from Great Brit- 
ain's ? 

A.— It differs from Great Britain in 
practice because the British Prime Min- 
ister, while technically and under law 
appointed by the Crown, really is ap- 
pointed on request or at will of the po- 
litical party that gains a majority in the 
House of Commons. Thus the British 
Prime Minister is responsible only theo- 
retically to the Crown and actually to 
Parliament. He stands or falls with his 
party and his successor is appointed at 
behest of the opposition that succeeds in 
overturning his majority. Furthermore, 
the King of England is ruler only in 
legal name. The British Prime Minister 
is tTie actual ruler. In Germany the Prime 
Minister (Imperial Chancellor or Reichs- 
kanzler) is responsible directly to the 
Crown (Emperor or Kaiser) and not to 
the Reichstag. The latter may vote heav- 
ily against his measures and still he may 
and does retain his office so long as the 
monarch chooses to keep him in power. 

Q. — How does Germany's system 
differ from ours? 
A. — We have no official resembling a 
Prime Minister. The actual and direct 



head of our Government is a President 
elected for a limited term. Our States, 
whatever their size, have absolutely equal 
representation in the U. S. Senate while 
the German States have differing repre- 
sentations, according to size. Our Sen- 
ators are elected, while the members to 
the Bundesrath are appointed by the 
Governments of the individual States. 
No one American State has hegemony in 
the United States through the Senate, 
whereas Prussia has hegemony in the 
Imperial Bundesrath, by virtue of the 
very large number of Prussian members. 

Q. — Is Prussian hegemony a struc- 
tural part of the German Em- 
pire? 

A. — Yes ; to the extent that the King of 
Prussia is constitutionally Emperor of 
Germany, and that Prussia's members to 
the upper Federal House (Bundesrath) 
are numerous enough to overbalance the 
votes of the rest. The extreme present 
power of the Bundesrath, however, is not 
wholly structural, and arises at least in 
part from the fact that the Reichstag (the 
lower house which is the popular assem- 
bly) has permitted many of its powers 
to lapse and furthermore has for many 
years been split into many groups of 
smaller or larger political parties and 
factions that can hardly unite sufficiently 
to make a decisive or imposing majority 
against the official government. 

Q. — Must our Senators vote as the 
States instruct them? 

A. — As a matter of political expediency, 
and in conformance with American prin- 
ciples, they usually meet an expressed de- 
sire of a majority of the people of their 
States. This is sometimes expressed 
through a Legislature, and may be prac- 
tically a mandate. But no Senator need 
conform unless he choose. The two Sen- 
ators from any one State may, and some- 
times do, vote on opposite sides. The 
members of the Bundesrath, to the con- 
trary, vote specifically as instructed and 
the representatives of each State cast 
their votes as a unit. 

Q. — Must the Imperial Chancellor 
be Prussian? 

A. — No. It has been habitual for Ger- 
man Emperors (being Prussian) to ap- 



214 



Germany (Political Structure) 



21 



point Prussians to the post, but there is 
no law for or against it The habit was 
broken in November, 1917, when Count 
George V. von Hertling, a Bavarian, was 
appointed to succeed Dr. Georg Michaelis, 
a Prussian 

Q. — Can any but a Hohenzollern 
become Emperor under the 
Constitution? 

A. — No The Constitution vests "the 
supreme direction of the military and 
political affairs" of the German Empire in 
the King of Prussia under the title of 
"Deutscher Kaiser" (German Emperor), 
and provides furthermore that the title 
shall be hereditary in the House of 
Hohenzollern. 

Q. — What is the German Constitu- 
tion? 

A. — It is a written Constitution adopted 
for the newly formed German Empire 
April 16. 1874 In many of its provi- 
sions it is identical with the Constitution 
that had been adopted bv the old North 
German Confederation, the union of 
German States that existed before the 
Franco-Prussian War. This original 
Constitution was written largely by Bis- 
marck, was accepted by the Princes of 
the various States, and was ratified by a 
convention chosen for the purpose by uni- 
versal suffrage. 

Q. — Is it like the Constitutions of 
other countries? 

A. — On the surface only, in the sense 
that all written Constitutions are guaran- 
tees for the people, limiting the powers 
of the official government. It contains 
what are always considered two large 
organic popular guarantees : a legislative 
popular assembly elected by universal 
suffrage, and a provision that this assem- 
bly shall hold the purse-strings ; i.e., wield 
the power of granting or withholding 
revenues desired by the government. 

Q. — What prevents liberal rule 
under the German Constitu- 
tion? 

A. — In part, the structural defects 
noted in a preceding answer concerning 
Prussian hegemony. In part, the polit- 
ical practice, which in itself is not pre- 
scribed by the Constitution, and could be 



radically changed if the people united to 
demand and enforce it. It would have to 
be a decidedly revolutionary change, 
however. To understand these necessary 
changes it is necessary first to understand 
the structural defects in the political edi- 
fice of Prussia, because that State's 
power in the Federal (Imperial) govern- 
ment is a vital feature of all possible 
reform. 

Q. — How is Prussia governed? 

A. — The State government of Prussia 
is by a House of Representatives (Land- 
tag), consisting of two chambers, the 
upper being known as "Herrenhaus" 
^House of Lords), and the lower as 
Chamber of Deputies. The King, as ex- 
ecutive head of the Government, is as- 
sisted by a council of ministers whom he 
himself appoints. 

Q. — Is the Herrenhaus at all like 
our State Senates? 

A. — No. The principle is entirely dif- 
ferent. The members are not elected by 
the people but are either appointed by 
the Crown or hold office by virtue of 
qualifications described in the Prussian 
Constitution, which dates back to 1850, 
and thus is far from modern. Under it 
the Herrenhaus has as members: (1) 
Royal Princes, (2) about 50 heads of a 
territorial nobility formed by the King, 
(3) a number of life-peers chosen by the 
King from land-owners, manufacturers 
and "national celebrities," (4) eight titled 
noblemen elected in the eight older Prus- 
sian provinces by all the resident land- 
owners, (5) representatives of the uni- 
versities, heads of chapters, and burgo- 
masters of towns with more than 50,000 
population, (6) an unlimited number of 
members nominated by the King for life 
or for a lesser period. 

Q. — Is this less democratic than 
the British House of Lords? 

A. — In outward structure it looks actu- 
ally less undemocratic. The British 
House of Lords consists overwhelmingly 
of hereditary Peers. There are no rep- 
resentatives, as such, of the industries 
and professions except for about 26 Arch- 
bishops and Bishops of the Church of 
England and 6 Law Lords in a body of 
about 660 members. In practice, however, 
there is a decided difference. Thus, 
though the King of England can create 



2l6 



Questions and Answers 



new Peers at will, in actuality they are 
created almost wholly by advice and wish 
of the ruling party. In addition, Parlia- 
mentary reforms have in recent years 
greatly extended the power of the House 
of Commons and decreased that of the 
Lords. The House of Lords cannot, since 
1910-11, veto a money bill (revenue or 
taxation bill) passed by the Commons, 
whereas the Prussian Herrenhaus can 
veto legislation by the Lower House. 
Furthermore, while the Herrenhaus has 
a minimum of hereditary members and a 
majority of some hundreds of repre- 
sentatives of commerce, industry, profes- 
sions, etc., the royal appointive power 
makes them very reactionary and really 
places control with the autocratically 
minded "Junker class." 

Q.— Just what is a "Junker"? 

A. — It is a term that dates back to 
feudal times, when it meant a junior 
nobleman, a "young Herr." That mean- 
ing, of course, has long since disappeared, 
with the English term "squire," which 
meant practically the same thing, a 
"squire" being one of gentle blood who 
had not yet been made knight. To-day, 
while the term "Junker" may be applied 
to any member of a hereditary nobility, it 
is directly applied to the firmly conserva- 
tive and aristocratic land-holders. Be- 
cause these men represent most drastic- 
ally the undemocratic, privileged classes, 
the term "Junker" has come to signify al- 
most a political party in Germany. It is 
used by the liberal opposition as a term 
of satire and reproach, and in its slang 
use it has come to be applied to any 
swaggering, haughty fellow. It is used 
mostly as referring to Prussians. 

Q. — How is the Prussian Lower 
House elected? 

A. — It is elected by "universal fran- 
chise" provided for under the Prussian 
Constitution, but this same Constitution 
provides for a grouping of the franchise 
that makes it both in principle and fact 
a decisively unequal one. The voters are 
divided into three classes: (1) voters 
who pay the highest taxes to the amount 
of one-third of the whole direct taxes 
levied ; (2) voters who pay the next high- 
est amount; (3) the lowest taxed. Each 
class elects by ballot one-third of the 
members of an electoral college which 
in turn elects the representatives for each 
district to the Lower House. The gross 
defect in this system is that the first class 
of voters may be insignificant in number 



in any given district and yet can elect 
one-third of the representatives. In some 
districts less than a dozen may possess 
this power. 

Q. — How does this work out in 
results ? 

A. — Roughly, it has been calculated that 
for all Prussia it gives only one-third of 
the representation to about 85 per cent 
of the population and gives the other 15 
per cent of the voters two-thirds of the 
Lower House, thus granting the Junker 
and capitalist classes an invincible ma- 
jority. 

Q. — What was the political con- 
test in Prussia in 1917-1918 
about? 

A. — It was over a determined attempt 
to reform the suffrage and thus to de- 
mocratize the composition of the Lower 
House. The Emperor's approval of the 
reform gave it national importance in it- 
self, quite apart from the fact that de- 
mocratization of Prussia would mean a 
mighty impetus toward national democra- 
tization. Prussian reform had been a 
national issue in Germany for several 
years before the war. It began in 1910 
when the Government introduced a bill 
changing the class voting system by put- 
ting voters of superior education into the 
second class, regardless of taxation, and 
abolishing indirect voting and thus largely 
reducing the over-balance of the first 
class. Socialists and Liberals refused the 
measure as inadequate. The Junker 
classes denounced it as revolutionary. It 
was withdrawn. 

Q. — Did this kill the movement for 
reform? 

A. — No. It accentuated it. It was made 
a subject of Reichstag agitation, and in 
the 1912 elections to the Reichstag, the 
Social Democrats gained 57 members, giv- 
ing them no altogether. This, with the 
90 members elected by the Liberals and 
the Radicals, gave the parties of opposi- 
tion ("the Left" as it is called in Eu- 
ropean political parlance) an actual 
numerical majority, and made the So- 
cialists the largest single party in the 
Reichstag. After the war began, the 
struggle was resumed in Prussia. The 
Imperial Chancellor (as the Prussian Min- 
ister of State) introduced a reform bill, 
backed by the Emperor's emphatic decla- 
rations in support. Thus the Prussian 



Germany (Political Structure) 



217 



Junkers were suddenly lined up against 
the government instead of being the sup- 
porters of it. They fought bitterly and 
uncompromisingly. Even the Emperor's 
threat of dissolution and new elections 
did not induce them to cease opposition or 
to abandon their plainly uttered purpose 
of emasculating any measure that might 
pass. 

Q. — Does politics alone give Prus- 
sia her big place in Germany? 

A. — Prussia is the "hustler" of Ger- 
many. Before the Franco-Prussian War, 
the other German States were very easy- 
going, both politically and socially. They 
were content with a loose national fede- 
ration that left them a ready prey to any 
other nation. They had done little to de- 
velop commerce or manufactures. Their 
science was great, but it was speculative 
or theoretical, being largely "art for art's 
sake," and thus limited largely to the 
laboratory or the university. The crude 
but intensely alive Prussia gave these 
latent German powers an impetus for 
practical achievement. Prussia made an 
iron whole out of the many widely vary- 
ing State armies. It was largely Prussia 
that flung railroads through the empire. 

Q. — Do the other States like Prus- 
sia? 

A. — As a rule, the general interests of 
all are so closely knit with the Federa- 
tion, that they do not raise the issue of 
Prussian hegemony. But when there arise 
questions with sharply defined State in- 
terests, there is very positive opposition 
to the big State. Decided jealousy exists 
between Prussia and Bavaria, the latter 
State being extremely insistent on its 
rights and dignity. 

Q.— Are the Prussians like the 
other Germans? 

A. — They are very unlike the rest. It 
is essentially the Prussian of the flat 
north country who has given the world the 
idea that the Germans are all a very 
blond type, with light blue eyes and fea- 
tures that, on the whole, express a stren- 
uous and not particularly amiable char- 
acter. As a matter of fact, while the 
Germans, like all the Germanic races, in- 
cluding the English, are, as a race, fair 
and blue-eyed, the great mass of Ger- 
many, to the south of Prussia, is far 
darker than the Prussians or the "Platt- 
Deutsche," as the other Germans call the 
northernmost Prussians. The Bavarian' 



hair and beards incline to a golden brown. 
The Wurttembergers are extremely dark 
—brunette, and even black-haired, look- 
ing rather Spanish in many cases. There 
really is a far greater difference between 
the northern and southern Germans than 
there is between our northerners and 
southerners. 

Q. — Do the southern Germans 
hate the Prussians? 

A. — There has always been a very gen- 
eral feeling of intellectual disdain for the 
Prussian. His marked practical abilities 
are recognized, though not always ad- 
mired, and his faults also are recognized 
and pretty sharply characterized. He is 
accounted crude and sordid by the south- 
ern Germans, and the appellation "Preuss" 
used by them is not complimentary. But 
events have shown that the whole German 
people has been trained to obey its rulers, 
to the extent of violating all other obli- 
gations. And the relentless, organizing 
Prussian has ruled Germany for nearly 
half a century. 

Q. — Is the national German suf- 
frage unequal like the Prus- 
sian? 

A. — The national (Imperial) elections 
to the Reichstag are by absolutely uni- 
versal manhood suffrage with the secret 
ballot system. Every citizen is entitled 
to his ballot if of legal age, and there is 
no qualification of property, etc. There 
are no classes of voters that can outvote 
other classes under the Constitution. 
There has, however, been no chance of 
apportionment in years and this, in ef- 
fect, leaves districts "gerrymandered." 

As a result of this, the members of the 
Reichstag do not in many cases accurately 
represent the people in a given commu- 
nity. The result being all to the benefit 
of the reactionary and governing classes, 
nothing has been done about it, though 
the promise is dangled before the social- 
ists when they become too noisy. 

Of course, too, the fact remains that no 
matter what changes might be made in 
the personnel of the Reichstag, the work- 
ing plan of the German government is so 
devised that the real power would be out 
of its hands. 

Q.— What is apportionment? 

A. — It is the system by which a repre- 
sentative to the legislative assembly is 
granted to a specified numerical group 
of the population. Thus, under our Con- 
stitution, Congress can, on the basis of a 



2l8 



Questions and Answers 



national census to be made every ten 
years, declare from time to time how 
many Congressmen shall be apportioned 
to each State and these States, again, are 
divided into Congress Districts. At pres- 
ent, each Congressman represents about 
200,000 people. Each Reichstag represen- 
tative represents about 132,000. 

Q. — What is the defect in Reichs- 
tag representation? 

A. — It lies in the fact that no new ap- 
portionment of districts has been made 
in many years. The result is that dis- 
tricts now enormously populated are rep- 
resented in the Reichstag on a basis of 
past sparse population. Districts that have 
become industrial lack the type of repre- 
sentation that they would send under mod- 
ern apportionment. This reacts especially 
on the new big cities ; and the political 
party suffering most from it is the So- 
cialist in all its groups. 

Q. — Which is the largest Lower 
House? 

A. — The British House of Commons 
with 670 members, against the French 
Chamber of Deputies with 602, our House 
of Representatives with 435 Congressmen 
and the Reichstag with 397 members. 

Q. — How do German Parliament- 
ary politics differ from ours? 

A. — The striking difference is in the 
big number of parties or "groups" into 
which the German Reichstag representa- 
tion is split, whereas in our Congress and 
in the British House of Commons there 
are, as a rule, only two chief parties, and 
such minor parties as are represented 
rarely have enough magnitude for any 
great degree of power. The German 
Reichstag, in contrast, had in 1912: no 
Social Democrats, 90 Liberals and Radi- 
cals, 70 Conservatives, 93 Centrists (party 
of the Center) and a few unclassified. 
On specific issues these various groups 
often split up into still more groups and 
if any combine on an issue, they do so 
only temporarily. 

Q. — What party is the Junker 
party? 

A. — The Conservative. It is the party 
of the landed interests, the "agrarians," 
officials and so forth. Because of its inter- 
est in agriculture, it gets the support of 
many peasants, especially the prosperous 
ones. It is the party that fights for pro- 



tective tariffs on agricultural products 
including meats. It stands also for co- 
lonial expansion and strong armies and 
navies. Being led largely by the Junker 
class it opposes political reform. 

Q. — What party do the Pan-Ger- 
mans represent? 

A. — They are a powerful part of the 
Conservative party. They are powerful, 
less by numbers than by solidarity, wealth, 
aggressiveness and the cohesive and com- 
manding influence of office-holding mem- 
bers. The whole Conservative Party is 
numerically small compared with others, 
but its power is undoubted. 

Q. — Is there a party of the middle 
classes? 

A. — Yes. The National-Liberals repre- 
sent the German middle class largely. 
They oppose the Conservatives on the 
tariff, favoring a "revision downward" 
on agricultural products, but they do not 
want free trade on manufactures. 

Q. — Why is there a Clerical party 
in German politics? 

A. — The Clerical party, better known 
in our day as the party of the Center be- 
cause it occupies a middle ground of its 
own between the Conservative and the 
Liberal and Radical groups, is a survival 
of the "Kulturkampf." This was a strug- 
gle between the German Government 
under Bismarck's leadership and the Papal 
doctrine of supreme authority. It had 
become a political issue particularly 
through the dogmas adopted in 1869 by 
the Vatican Council, a great ecclesiastical 
assemblage convened in Rome. Begin- 
ning in 1871, the Kulturkampf lasted for 
years. In 1873-1875 there were enacted 
a series of laws known as "May Laws," 
making civil marriage compulsory, oblig- 
ing all candidates for priesthood to at- 
tend government schools and universities 
and to pass government examinations. 
The Pope declared the laws null and void, 
and the fight became intensely bitter. It 
did not cease till 1878 when a new Pope, 
Leo XIII, with more moderate views, 
made peace with Bismarck. Between that 
date and 1886 most of the "May Laws" 
were repealed. The Clerical party became 
much reduced in numbers and activity, 
but remained as an important factional 
power in politics. Its tactical strength to- 
day lies in the fact that its support may 
give a majority to the side it joins. 



Germany {Political Structure) 



219 



Q. — How many Socialists are in 
Germany? 

A. — The general German elections of 
1912 showed 4,250,000 Socialists in a total 
number of about 11 million voters. They 
had 2% million adherents more than the 
next most powerful party, the Center 
party. The parties that followed in num- 
erical importance were : Liberals, Radi- 
cals and Conservatives. Each of these 
had more than a million adherents. Thus, 
while the Socialist element among the 
German voters is far from a possible ma- 
jority of the popular suffrage, it is easily 
the most powerful in the empire, so far 
as massed solidarity is concerned. 

Q. — What led autocratic German 
Government to socialize the 
State? 

A. — An early realization of the prob- 
lems that were being crystallized by the 
modern development of industry. The 
fact that Germany was industrializing her- 
self almost literally over night naturally 
made many of these problems much more 
clear to German eyes than they would 
be in countries that had developed into 
industrialism gradually. Bismarck was 
foremost in perceiving and facing the 
new social questions and conditions that 
from 1880 on were tending every- 
where in the world to create two huge 
antagonistic classes— the working class 
and the capital-owning, employing class. 
He was determined that the German State 
should avoid the error of producing a 
working class that regarded the State as 
an enemy. 

Q. — What were the chief laws that 
socialized the German State? 

A. — They were a series of laws passed 
from 1883 to 191 1. The first was the Ill- 
ness Insurance Law of 1883, making in- 
surance compulsory on all laborers with 
wages less than $500 a year, the insurance 
fund being made up by contributions from 
employers and employees. In 1884 fol- 
lowed the Accident Insurance Law, the 
funds for which are drawn entirely from 
employers on the principle that accidents 
are part of the risk that is taken in earn- 
ing profits. An Old Age and Invalidity 
Law was passed in 1889. It went beyond 
all preceding policies, and formed a pen- 
sion fund made of contributions from the 
i-tatt as well as employers and working- 
men, tor workers totally incapacitated at 
any time and for those who passed 70 
years (reduced to 65 years in 1915). The 
pensions range horn $30 to $60 annually. 



Q. — What were the laws of 191 1? 

A. — They were a codification or unifi- 
cation in about 2,000 articles of the whole 
series of social insurance and protection 
laws, and it was largely the passage of 
this very voluminous and remarkable leg- 
islation that focussed the attention of the 
world on the vast issues raised by the 
policy of the socialized State. 

Q. — Did the Government at the 
same time fight Socialism? 

A. — Yes. Even while Bismarck declared 
that it was the duty of a State to protect 
its weaker members from being "run 
over and trampled under foot on the high- 
road of life," he remained a champion 
of a series of so-called "exceptional laws" 
aimed at the growing power of the Social 
Democratic doctrine. The formation of 
a Social Democratic party followed the 
Franco-Prussian War almost immediately, 
and from the first it opposed Bismarck 
bitterly and openly worked for the estab- 
lishment of a Democratic republic. The 
first repressive laws were enacted in 1878 
after two attempts had been made to as- 
sassinate Emperor William (the first Ger- 
man Emperor and grandfather of the 
present Emperor). He was aged and 
undoubtedly beloved, and the Government 
had no difficulty in passing laws that for 
a time practically outlawed Social De- 
mocracy. 

Q. — Did the repressive laws hinder 
the growth of Socialism? 

A. — No. They increased it. Even the 
clear-sighted Bismarck did not realize, 
and never would admit, that force against 
deep-seated political ideas only strength- 
ens them. While he had a great intellec- 
tual disdain for force used by short- 
sighted government to extinguish prob- 
lems that it was incompetent to solve 
properly, he still believed that force was 
an efficient and normal part of govern- 
ment. Therefore during the years of his 
leadership the German State continually 
socialized itself and continually fought 
Socialism. It must not be forgotten, how- 
ever, that his political genius told him 
that socialization by government was in 
itself likely to blunt Socialism's sharpest 
weapon. "Give the workingman the right 
to employment as long as he has health, 
assure him care when he is ill and sup- 
port when he is old," he said in the Reich- 
stag, "then these gentlemen, the Social- 
ists, will utter their bird-calls in vain." 
Another time he told the middle-class 
Liberals, who weie against the social laws, 



220 



Questions and Answers 



that they could not frighten him with the 
word "socialism." He said : "If you be- 
lieve that you can call up spectres with 
this word, you assume an attitude that I 
abandoned long ago." 

Q. — What was the growth of So- 
cialism during the repressive 
laws? 

A. — A table presented by Professor 
Schapiro in the most recent account of 
European political development ("Mod- 
ern and Contemporary European His- 
tory") shows that the gain was not only 
steady but extraordinary. In 1871 the 
Socialist vote in the Reichstag elections 
was 124,500, and they won only 2 seats. 
In 1874 it had more than doubled (352,- 
000) and they returned 10 Reichstag mem- 
bers. 'In only one election, that of 1881, 
was there a marked falling off of the 
Socialist vote." In the next Reichstag 
election, that of 1884, they passed the half- 
million mark (550,000) and won 24 seats. 
In 1890, the year of Bismarck's retire- 
ment, the "exceptional laws" passed out 
of existence by not being renewed. In 
that year's Reichstag elections the So- 
cialist vote reached 1,427,000 and returned 
35 representatives. In 1898 it passed 2 
million, in 1903 it exceeded 3 million, and 
in 1912 a vote of 4,250,000 sent no So- 
cialist representatives to the Reichstag. 

Q. — What are the leading German 
Socialist political principles? 

A. — Leaving aside the confused issues 
that have been raised by the war, the 
principles of the German Socialist Demo- 
cratic party were laid down as follows 
in the famous Erfurt Congress held by 
them in 1891 after the repeal of the anti- 
Socialist laws : maximum demands, abo- 
lition of private capital and establishment 
of a co-operative commonwealth ; mini- 
mum demands (for immediate prosecu- 
tion) substitution of a popular militia for 
the standing army, heavy inheritance and 
income taxes, universal 8-hour work-day, 
woman suffrage, equal, direct and secret 
suffrage for all legislative bodies, propor- 
tional representation, full freedom of 
speech and assembly, civil equality for 
men and women, free secular education 
and complete separation of Church and 
State. 

Q. — Have the German Socialists 
always opposed militarism? 

A. — As recently before the war as 1912, 
there was a big Socialist anti-military ex- 



plosion in the Reichstag. It was on 
October 20, 1912, and on that same day 
demonstrations were made in Dusseldorf, 
Dortmund, Bremen, Kiel, Leipzig, Berlin, 
Hamburg, Dresden, Spandau, Cassel, 
Frankfurt and Stuttgart. Similar ones 
occurred on November 17, 1912, in Bre- 
men and Hanover. 

In October and November, 1912, pro- 
tests against the advances of Austrian di- 
plomacy in the Balkan situation were 
made in the Bavarian Parliament, and in 
the Austrian Parliament. Protest meet- 
ings were held during these months at 
Prague and other Hungarian towns, Vi- 
enna, and throughout Austria. 

The German Socialists protested in Par- 
liament (Reichstag) against the Zabern 
Affair on November 28 and December 3 
and 4, 1913, and again on January 23 and 
24, 1914. 

Q. — Did the Socialists ever vote 
for Army and Navy appropria- 
tions ? 

A. — They did so once — the year before 
the war. Before 1913 the German and 
Austrian Socialists, in their Parliaments, 
had voted at all times against the Army 
and Navy budgets, and against all in- 
crease in taxes for military purposes. In 
September, 1913, however, when rival 
German and French army bills made a 
tense situation, the German Socialists 
voted in favor though the French Social- 
ists voted against the French three-year 
army bill under Jaurez, who was assassi- 
nated, largely because of this opposition, 
soon after war began. 

Q. — What did the Socialists do 
when war came? 

A. — At the gathering of the menace, 
the German Socialist party issued a 
"Proclamation," in which occurs the fol- 
lowing: "Not one drop of a German sol- 
dier's blood shall be sacrificed to the lust 
of power of the Austrian rulers and to the 
imperialistic profit-interests." 

Mass-meetings were held in Berlin on 
July 28, 1914 — 28 meetings in all, with_ an 
attendance estimated at 70,000. Similar 
meetings were held in nearly all the other 
large cities, often dispersed by police and 
soldiers. On July 29, 1914, the Vorwaerts, 
the Socialist daily in Berlin, placed the 
blame on Austria. 

In July, 1914, Austrian Socialists pro- 
tested in Parliament and in mass-meetings 
against the policy pursued by the Austro- 
Hungarian Government towards Serbia. 

When war was declared, however, the 



Germany (Political Structure) 



221 



Austrian and Hungarian Socialists sup- 
ported their Government, on the ground 
that their countries were being attacked. 
The Socialists of England and France 
thereupon supported their government. 

Q. — Did no German Socialist vote 
against war? 

A. — Only one Socialist, . Karl Liebk- 
necht, opposed the government and he was 
expelled from the party for this reason. 
Later in the war, when Germany's policies 
in Belgium and Russia plainly went be- 
yond any possible limits of defensive ac- 
tion, a block of about 20 Socialists de- 
clared that the government had under- 
taken to pursue a war for aggressive ends. 
These Socialists broke away from their 
fellows and formed a new group which 
made its basic demand that the govern- 
ment bring about an immediate cessation 
of the war. 

Q. — Did the German Socialists 
ever assume power during the 
war? 

A. — Early in 1917, a formula pronounc- 
ing against annexation of territory and 
proposing a general renunciation of in- 
demnities was agitated by the majority 
faction of German Socialists. The Coun- 
cil of Workmen's and Soldiers' Deputies 
in Petrograd also made "no annexations, 
no indemnities" a foremost principle of 
their attitude toward the war. In July, 
1917, a decided political crisis was created 
as result of a determined factional fight 
against the Imperial Chancellor, von 
Bethmann-Hollweg. He was overthrown 
and on July 14, 1917, was succeeded by 
Dr. Georg Mlchaelis. Immediately there 
occurred a most unexpected coalition be- 
tween two parties not usually associated 
or agreed in legislative matters — the So- 
cialists and the Center. The latter is the 
Roman Catholic party, and used to be 
known as the Clerical party. While ac- 
customed as a habitual part of its po- 
litical tactics to attain a "balance of 
power" by voting with or against the 
other parties, it had not often affiliated 
with the Socialists. The sudden move 
made the Centrists and the Socialists 
temporarily the masters of the Reich- 
stag. 

Q. — Did the Socialists exercise 
their control importantly? 

A. — At the time the Socialists and the 
Centrists achieved a Parliamentary suc- 
cess that might have altered the aspect 



of the entire war-situation, had they been 
able to make it permanent. On July 19, 
1917, they succeeded in passing a resolu- 
tion declaring that "The Reichstag labors 
for peace and a mutual understanding and 
lasting reconciliation among the nations. 
Forced acquisitions of territory and po- 
litical, economic and financial violations 
are incompatible with such a peace." 

Q. — Did the Reichstag adhere to 
this principle? 

A. — By the peace treaty between Ger- 
many and the Bolshevik Government of 
Russia, signed March, 1918, the Russians 
gave up Finland, Esthonia, Livonia, Cour- 
land, Poland and Lithouania in the west, 
the Ukraine in the south, Batum, Erivan 
and Kars in the Caucasus. While none 
of these territories was declared annexed 
to the Central Powers, and, indeed, while 
they were referred to as independent, the 
general tenor of the treaty and many of 
its provisions, with the expanding military 
occupation by German troops gave it an 
aspect that convinced the world that a 
huge scheme of aggrandizement was in- 
tended. Notwithstanding, the treaty was 
ratified in the Reichstag by an almost 
unanimous vote, the Social Democrats vot- 
ing for it like all the others. 

Q. — Does the Imperial Bundesrath 
resemble the Senate or the 
Lords ? 

A. — No. This Upper House of the 
German Imperial Parliament has specifi- 
cally a character wholly its own. Its 
members are appointed for each session 
by the rulers of the various German 
States. The consent of the Bundesrath 
is necessary for treaties, for the dissolu- 
tion of the Reichstag and for amendments 
to, or changes in, the Constitution. As 14 
of the 61 votes in the Bundesrath are 
sufficient to defeat a Constitutional 
amendment, this Upper House possesses 
a compelling power over changes in the 
fundamental laws of the Empire. 

Q. — How is the Bundesrath appor- 
tioned? 

A. — Prussia appoints the largest num- 
ber of members — 17. Bavaria appoints 
the next larger number — 6. Saxony and 
Wiirttemberg each appoint 4. Baden, 
Hesse and Alsace-Lorraine each appoint 
3. Mecklenburg Schwerin and Braun- 
schweig (Brunswick) appoint 2 each. The 
other States appoint 1 each. Thus, no 
one State has a majority; but Prussia, 



222 



Questions and Anstvers 



partly by having 17 votes to begin with, 
and partly by controlling many other 
votes, can always control the 61 members 
of the Bundesrath. 

Q. — How many States are in the 
German Empire? 

A. — There are 25 States and one Reichs- 
land or territorial province (Alsace-Lor- 
raine). Of the States, 4 are Kingdoms — 
Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Wiirttemberg. 
There are 6 Grand Duchies, the largest of 
which is Baden. The other States are : 
5 Duchies, 7 Principalities and 3 Repub- 
lics. 

Q. — Are there really republics in 
Germany? 

A. — Yes. There are three little, but pow- 
erful, republics — the three free towns or 
cities of Liibeck, Bremen and Hamburg, 
each of which proudly calls itself Freie 
or Hansestadt (Free or Hanseatic City). 
The freedom of these independent cities 
really dates back centuries to the Han- 
seatic League, but they are under modern 
constitutions, adopted in 1848 and 1849, 
and often revised to make them highly 
up-to-date. 

Q. — Do these German republics 
rule themselves? 

A. — They are as independent in their 
own right as are the big Kingdoms of 
Germany. They are ruled by Senates 
elected for life and by big bodies of burg- 
esses, elected by all the citizens for terms 
of years ranging from four to six. Lii- 
beck has 120 burgesses, Hamburg has 160, 
and Bremen has 140. The head of the 
Republic is Burgermeister (Mayor), who 
is elected by the citizens. Bremen has two 
burgermeisters elected at the same time, 
and governing together for four years. 
Hamburg has two, a first and a second. 
Liibeck contents herself with one. 

Q. — Are the republics important in 
the empire? 

A. — Bremen and Hamburg are the two 
shipping ports of the empire. Through 
them flows the commerce of the nation, 
and the \ x / 2 millions of citizens are among 
the richest and most influential in the 
country, wielding an enormous political 
and financial power. The great German 
steamship lines are owned directly by 
Bremen and Hamburg men. Both ports 
count their shipping by the million tons, 
and Hamburg has often been described 



as the most advanced and elaborate port 
in the world. 

Q. — Have all the German States 
Parliaments of their own? 

A. — All have separate representative as- 
semblies, except the two grand duchies of 
Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Mecklenburg- 
Strelitz. Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Wiirt- 
temberg, Baden and Hesse have the two- 
chamber system. The smaller States have 
one House only. The smallest principal- 
ity, that of Schaumberg-Lippe, has only 
15 members. Brunswick, the largest of 
the smaller States, has a chamber of 48 
members. 

Q. — Have the Germans a system of 
second ballots? 

A. — Yes. They have a system for the 
Reichstag elections, under which, if abso- 
lute majority is not obtained by one can- 
didate over all the others who are con- 
testing the election, a second ballot is 
taken between the two candidates who 
have received the greatest number of 
votes. 

Q. — What is the meaning of the 
Kaiser's title "War Lord"? 

A. — In German, the title is "Kriegs- 
Herr," and "War Lord" is merely a lit- 
erally correct translation, the actual mean- 
ing being "War Commander." The title 
signifies officially that whoever \s Em- 
peror of Germany becomes by virtue of 
this office Supreme Commander of the 
Army and Navy in war. 

The Kaiser has not the absolute com- 
mand over the forces of the entire Ger- 
man Army in peace. Article 66 of the 
German Constitution provides that the 
German princes, especially the kings of 
Bavaria, Wiirttemberg and Saxony, are 
the chiefs of the troops belonging to their 
territory (six army corps of twenty-four). 
The absolute disposition of the German 
Army passes legally to the Kaiser only in 
the moment when the consent of the 
States for declaration of war has been 
obtained through the Bundesrath. 

Q. — Can the Kaiser make war? 

A. — He cannot declare an offensive 
war, but a clause in the constitution pro- 
vides that he can declare war if defen- 
sive. If war is not defensive, he must 
have the consent of the Bundesrath, or 
Federal Council. This differs from Amer- 
ican Constitutional law in that our Presi- 
dent has not power to declare either of- 



Germany {Political Structure) 



223 



fensive or defensive state of war, because 
the Constitution vests the war-making 
power in Congress, and this power is in 
the whole Congress, not merely in the 
Senate. This is as in France, where both 
Chambers must assent to war. In Great 
Britain the King can enter war without 
the consent of the House of Commons, 
but in actual practice this power has fallen 
into complete abeyance, since the ruling 
force is a Ministry which is in turn de- 
pendent on party majority in the Com- 
mons. 

Q. — If the Reichstag refuses to 
pass the Kaiser's measures, 
what can he do? 

A. — He can dissolve it, and thus cause 
another election. If the new body again 
refuse to approve of his legislation, he 
can again dissolve Parliament, and a sec- 
ond election would be held. Such a case 
has never arisen to date (August, 1918), 
but it is not impossible. 

Q. — Can the Kaiser dissolve the 
Reichstag at any time? 

A. — Yes. He has the right either to 
"prorogue" it (that means to close its 
session temporarily) or to dissolve it en- 
tirely. All that he needs is a majority 
vote of the Bundesrath. He cannot, how- 
ever, prorogue the Reichstag indefinitely, 
and he cannot go on without a Reichstag. 
If he prorogues the Reichstag, it can be 
for only a period of 30 days, unless the 
Reichstag itself consents to a longer pe- 
riod. If he dissolves a Reichstag, new 
elections must be held within sixty days, 
and a new session must be held within 
ninety days. 

Q. — Can the Legislative Assem- 
blies of other nations be dis- 
solved? 

A. — Of the larger nations in the war, 
the United States Congress is the only 
legislative assembly that cannot on oc- 
casion be dissolved. The American Presi- 
dent can neither prorogue nor dissolve 
it, Congress being a co-equal body of 
government. The President of France 
can dissolve the Chamber of Deputies 
with consent of the Senate. He can ad- 
journ both Chambers, but not for more 
than a month, and not more than twice in 
the same session. The King of Italy can 
dissolve the Lower House at any time, be- 
ing bound only to order new elections and 
convoke a new session within four 
months. The Emperor of Japan can pro- 



rogue or dissolve the House of Represen- 
tatives. Every session of the British Par- 
liament must end with a prorogation from 
the Crown, and the King can dissolve a 
Parliament, but no King in modern times 
has done so on his own authority. 

Q. — What is the British Parlia- 
mentary practice? 

A. — What the King does about Par- 
liament is purely a matter of form. In 
actual fact, Parliament is prorogued 
when the majority party decides to do so, 
and it is dissolved when the majority 
party's Cabinet has been outvoted in Par- 
liament on some national measure. An 
adverse vote (a vote of lack of confidence, 
as it is called) results by custom in a gen- 
eral election to bring in a new Parlia- 
ment. As a matter of strict law, a Cabi- 
net could hold out ; but it could get no 
measures passed, and it would antagonize 
the voters by flouting British custom, 
which is stronger than written law. The 
British Constitution really is largely a 
matter of National custom ; and the King 
acts accordingly, proroguing or dissolving 
Parliament by advice of the Cabinet. 

Q. — How much power has the 
Crown Prince of Germany? 

A. — Technically he has none (except 
of course such military power as is given 
to him by virtue of commanding an 
army). Politically he occupies about the 
same officially unimportant position as 
does the Heir-Apparent to the British 
throne (Prince of Wales). 

His importance in the national and in- 
ternational politics of the day comes from 
two main causes: (1) he might at any 
moment become Emperor through the 
death of Wilhelm ; (2) he can gather 
around him, or be used as a rallying point 
by, factions that want the Empire to hold 
by the sword what it has gained by the 
sword. This would make a sharp rift 
between his father, the Emperor, and him- 
self, should the Emperor lean to the lib- 
eral and moderate factions in Germany 
and declare for concessions and more or 
less democracy. Of course it might prove 
a double-edged weapon. The Crown 
Prince's faction might win ; but should 
it lose, or should it involve the Empire in 
ruin, it might end the reign of the Hohen- 
zollern dynasty. 

Q. — What would happen should 
the Kaiser be killed? 

A. — The present Crown Prince would 



224 



Questions and Answers 



succeed to the Imperial office by virtue of 
the Constitution. There is hardly a doubt 
that the military party would proclaim 
him Emperor instantly, in order to pre- 
vent any possible move by the Socialists 
and others to change the existing provi- 
sions of the national law. 

Q. — Did the present emperor, while 
Crown Prince try to over-ride 
his father? 

A. — Yes. It did not reach the extent 
of a quarrel or even a serious disturb- 
ance of family relations ; but the present 
Kaiser's father was altogether too placid 
an Emperor to suit his very strenuous 
son. Friedrich III (lovingly called 
"Unser Fritz" by the Germans) was a 
singularly tolerant, kindly, easy-going 
man, very simple and old-fashioned. His 
Germany was the old, deliberate Ger- 
many. The son, Wilhelm, was intensely 
restless — ambitious, bent on showy activ- 
ities, determined when his time came to 
rule personally and imperially, a terror 
to responsible statesmen who never knew 
where he would break out next. It was 
as inevitable that he should become des- 
perately impatient with the mild Frederick 
as it was that he should dismiss stiff old 
Bismarck as soon as he felt himself 
secure enough. 

Q. — What nations in the war elect 
their ruling heads? 

A.— Only the United States. The Brit- 
ish Prime Minister is appointed by the 
King (though, in actual practice, the rul- 
ing majority in Parliament makes up its 
mind whom it wants, and the King has 
always appointed that particular person). 
The President of France is elected by 
the Senate and Chamber of Deputies. He 
has very little power, and the real ruler, 
the Premier, though appointed by the 
President, really is appointed only ac- 
cording to the wishes of the party in 
power at a given moment. In Italy the 
Ministry is appointed by the King, usually 
in accord with the ruling majority. 

Q. — Is there a State religion in 
Germany? 

A. — The Imperial Constitution provides 
for entire liberty of conscience, and for 
complete equality among all religious con- 
fessions. In the different States there 
are various relations between Church and 
State. Many States make grants to va- 



rious religions. Baden, for instance, 
makes annual grants to the Roman Cath- 
olic and Protestant Churches and to the 
Jews. Bavaria has Catholic and Protest- 
ant dignitaries in its Upper House, etc. 
The majority of the religious population 
of Germany, as a whole, is Protestant, 
and the majority of the Protestants are 
Lutheran. These Protestants form about 
62 per cent of the church census. Catho- 
lics form about 37 per cent. Roman Cath- 
olics are in the majority in three of the 
States — Bavaria, Baden and Alsace-Lor- 



Q. — What nation has been fore- 
most in science? 

A. — The rival claims of warring na- 
tions have so filled the world, and there 
has arisen so much dispute over historical 
facts which no one dreamed of disputing 
before 1914, that any categorical reply 
may seem merely contentious or contro- 
versial. Here, however, are a few facts 
that may be considered as quite estab- 
lished. Lavoisier, a Frenchman, gave the 
world a large part of its modern founda- 
tion of chemistry. An Englishman, John 
Dalton, gave us the atomic theory. Jo- 
hann Jakob Berzelius, a Swede, and Ama- 
deo Avagadro, an Italian, added greatly 
to it. Friedrich Wohler, a German, gave 
us the foundation for synthetic organic 
chemistry. , Justus von Liebig, a German, 
gave the world chemical discoveries of 
vast importance for food and his experi- 
ments with artificial fertilizers laid a 
basis for scientific agriculture. In phys- 
ics an American, Benjamin Thompson, 
discovered the nature of heat. An Eng- 
lishman, Sir Humphrey Davy, gave the 
world knowledge of immense practical 
value. The theory of conservation of 
energy, equally valuable to the world, 
came from James Prescott Joule, an Eng- 
lishman, and Julius Robert Mayer, a Ger- 
man. Experiments on the nature of sound 
by the German, Herman von Helmholtz. 
laid the foundation for our science of 
acoustics. In medicine, a Russian, Elias 
Metschnikoff, discovered that in some dis- 
eases the white 'blood cells defend the 
body. Louis Pasteur, a Frenchman, was 
pioneer in serum-therapy, discovering pre- 
ventative hydrophobia and anthrax. Rob- 
ert Koch, a German, found the germ of 
tuberculosis. Emil von Behring, a Ger- 
man, discovered anti-toxin serum for 
diphtheria. An American, Dr. John C. 
Warren, first used anaesthesia. An Eng- 
lishman, Lord Lister, developed antisep- 
sis. A German, Wilhelm Rontgen, dis- 
covered the X-ray. 



Germany (Political Structure) 



225 



Q. — What nation led in modern ex- 
ploration ? 

A. — In the nineteenth century, a Swede, 
Sven Hedin, explored Central Asia. An 
Englishman, Colonel Younghusband, pene- 
trated Thibet and entered Lhassa, till 
then sealed to the world. A German, 
Alexander von Humboldt, explored the 
Amazon and Orinoco valleys and founded 
modern physical geography. An Ameri- 
can, Robert Peary, reached the North 
Pole. A Norwegian, Roald Amundsen, 
reached the South Pole. An English ex- 
pedition under Captain R. F. Scott, 
reached it a month later but perished on 
the return journey. A Scotchman, David 
Livingstone, explored Africa. Henry M. 
Stanley, an Englishman, crossed it from 
east to west. 

Q. — What does German law mean 
by "Fortress Confinement"? 

A. — It is imprisonment that does not 
carry with it the stigma or onus of im- 
prisonment in jails or penitentiaries. In 
fact, in a sense it actually gives the im- 
prisoned person a certificate of personal 
honor, and men who have suffered this 
form of punishment need feel no sense of 
shame. They are not convicts, either in 
the legal or the moral sense. Officers of 
the German Army are punished for mili- 
tary offenses in this way. Men accused 
of moral crime are not sent to fortresses 
and it is used mainly for political offenses 
in the case of civilians. 

Q. — Does fortress imprisonment 
differ in actual details from 
other imprisonment? 

A. — A "fortress," in the legal sense, 
may be a very wide area indeed. It is 
not necessarily limited to the actual lim- 
its of a fortification. There are degrees 
of fortress imprisonment. A man may be 
sentenced to "close confinement" in a 
fortress, in which case he may not be 
permitted to go beyond the exact limits 
of a walled fort. In very severe sen- 
tences he may even be confined largely 
to a casemate, but this is unusual. Most 
cases permit the arrested man to move 
practically at will throughout the utter- 
most limits of a fortified area. In some 
cases, this may give him practical free- 
dom of a whole town. 

Q.— What is the "Hymn of 
Hate"? 

A. — A German poem of hatred against 
England, written by Ernest Lissauer, in 



1915. It has been set to music and appears 
in some of the German school books. 

Q. — Why are the Germans called 
"Bodies"? 

A. — "Boche" appears to be an abbre- 
viation of "Alboche," an Alsatian word 
for "Allemand" (meaning German). 

In Alsace-Lorraine, it has been for 
some time used as a synonym for drunk- 
ard, liar, barbarian, and adjectively for 
"unmentionably cruel." The French 
adopted the word in the beginning of the 
war as typifying the Prussians. Many 
other explanations are given from time to 
time of what the slang-word really means, 
and how it came to be applied. 

It was probably used also in the Franco- 
Prussian War in 1870, for Zola, in his 
novel La Debacle, a story dealing with 
the war, puts the term in the mouths of 
French soldiers to designate the Ger- 
mans. The term ce boche was used, before 
the Franco-Prussian War at least, as 
equivalent to "that chump," and tete de 
boche is given by French dictionaries of 
slang as equivalent to "wooden-pate" or 
"blockhead." It is, perhaps, for this rea- 
son that some French scholars derive the 
present use of boche from caboche, a 
French word meaning head. 

Q. — Did the Germans officially 
encourage polygamy? 

A. — It has been repeatedly stated by 
correspondents and non-combatant work- 
ers abroad, as a matter of common 
knowledge that Belgian and French 
women were forced to bear children by 
German soldiers — with the intent of aug- 
menting the future man-power of 
Deutschland. 

More than one writer has asserted that 
the same idea had been carried out with 
women of the fatherland ; and this charge 
had a certain amount of confirmation in 
the free circulation of an extraordinary 
pamphlet by Carl Hermann Torges. 
This was entitled : "The Secondary 
Marriage as Only Means for the Rapid 
Creation of a New and Powerful Army 
and the Purification of Morality"; and it 
advocated this handling of human beings 
like animal breeding stock. 

Q. — Is it true that the German 
Government has been willing 
to spend large sums of money 
in the United States to sup- 
press evidence that the Kaiser 
planned the war? 
A. — It has been stated with authority 



226 



Questions and Answers 



that an American journalist, during a 
yachting trip with the German Emperor 
ten years ago, got an interview in which 
the monarch expressed ideas that seemed 
to imply a plan of something like world- 
domination. The journalist prepared a 
magazine article for a New York maga- 
zine. The German Ambassador, von 
Bernstorff, heard about it after the mag- 
azine was printed and before it was pub- 
lished. The German Government bought 
all the sheets of the magazine, packed 
them in tin-lined cases, and sent a German 
warship for them. The article has never 
been published, but one copy of the mag- 
azine has found its way into the hands of 
Secretary of State Lansing, and has been 
added to the evidence in the case which 
will probably be published at the con- 
clusion of the war. 

Q. — Did the Germans have many 
troops in Africa? 

A. — There were only 2,000 Germans in 
East Africa, but they had drilled about 
18,000 natives, and they used them against 
the South African forces. General Smuts, 
the Boer commander of the British Afri- 
can forces relied chiefly on Boer, British 
colonial forces and Indian troops in his 
campaign against the German African 



colonies with some natives. The Belgian 
Army, which advanced from the Congo, 
was almost entirely composed of natives, 
and the Portuguese forces which entered 
German East Africa from the south were 
native for the most part. 

Q.— Can Germany get more sol- 
diers out of its population than 
any other nation? 

A. — Many figures have been given in 
the first three years of war to prove that 
this or that nation can or cannot extract 
from its population as much human war 
material as some other nation can. Most 
of these mathematical exercises were val- 
uable only as intellectual pastimes. It 
seems true to say that Germany can, with- 
out doubt, extract from her growing 
young male population at least as many 
men as any other nation can draw. And 
it may be assumed, as a further element 
of calculation, that Germany's very up- 
to-date hygienic care for her population 
had given the growing males a maximum 
chance for physical efficiency. The hard 
conditions of the war-years, however, with 
the diminution of the food-rations, have 
presumably served to lower the physique 
of the youngsters who are eligible for 
army service in 1918. 



GERMANY (FOOD) 



Q. — What did a German get to eat 
in 1918? 

A. — The German bill of fare was about 
as follows : 

Meat : In Berlin, 250 grams — about one- 
half a pound — per person per week; in 
Munich, 200 grams ; in Saxony, 150 grams. 

Bread : 250 grams per day per person ; 
all persons performing manual labor, 500 
grams. 

Potatoes : In Berlin, five to seven 
pounds per person per week; in Bavaria, 
usually ten pounds per person per week. 

Butter and Fats : In Berlin, from 50 to 
75 grams per person per week; in Leip- 
zig, from 30 to 90 grams ; in Bavaria, 
between 60 and 90 grams. 

Milk: Babies and patients in hospitals 
now receive from one-fourth to one-half 
quart per day each. A year ago every 
child and every sick person received one 
liter (y^ quart) per day. 

Sugar : 800 grams per month per per- 
son. 

Vegetables : In season. 

Fish : Whenever obtainable. 

Jam or marmalade : About one-fourth 
of a pound per month. 

No coffee, tea or cocoa, but small quan- 
tities of coffee and tea substitutes. No 
pure beer, but only beer substitutes. 

Q. — What were the military ra- 
tions? 

A. — The soldier's food ration was as 
follows : 

Breakfast: Coffee or a substitute, with 
dry bread. 

Lunch : Soup with occasional small 
pieces of meat ; vegetables and bread. 

Supper : Bread and marmalade. 

One pound of war bread daily was al- 
lowed. 

Q.— What is the "iron ration"? 

A. — The "iron ration" is the emergency 
ration which the German soldier carries 
in his pack. It is called "iron ration" 
because iron-like rules surround it. The 
soldier must carry it always, and no sol- 
dier must ever, under any circumstances, 
touch it except in the last extremity. 
When the starvation-blockade began to 
squeeze the people hard, and they were 
reduced to their smallest portions of the 
poorest food-materials, it became a grim 
jest among civilians to refer to their 
"iron rations." 



Q. — Was the German bread ticket 
intended to effect an equal dis- 
tribution ? 

A. — No. It was issued, at first, that the 
poor might have cheap bread and that 
those who were willing to buy more food 
than the bread ticket prescribed should 
have to pay heavily for the indulgence. 

Q. — Is Germany's bread very poor? 

A. — The official regulations provided 
for a bread that may or may not be 
highly palatable, but that consists of per- 
fectly healthful and nourishing mixtures. 
"War breads" were a prominent part of 
Germany's early defense against starva- 
tion when the oceanic blockade began. As 
we have found, these various war breads 
were awful only in name, and actually 
have turned out to be decidedly good, on 
the whole, so that it may be that the 
United States, as a mere matter of 
health, pleasant variety, and perfectly 
profitable economy will retain most of 
these various bran, oatmeal, rye, corn and 
wheat mixtures in its normal dietary. 

However, during the "peak" of the ce- 
real famine pinch in Germany, the war 
breads were decidedly not nice or good, 
and in very many places throughout the 
empire they were quite terribly bad. Some 
reports say that they were made of less 
than 40 per cent wheat, the other 60 per 
cent being sawdust, powdered straw, and 
other such organic but vile admixtures. 
That kind of bread means that a part, at 
least, of the German population was re- 
duced almost to the situation of German 
peasants in the Thirty Years' War, when 
they often ate straw. 

Q. — Is it true that the Germans 
made many food substitutes ? 

A. — Yes. The German newspapers have 
carried masses of advertising of substi- 
tutes for all the various kind of food that 
are short. According to the reports gen- 
erally circulated through the outer world, 
there were as many as 7,000 substitutes 
in 1917, but expert analysis of the avail- 
able lists shows that this huge number is 
arrived at by lumping the following four 
chief classes of substitutes: (1) normal 
substitutes like oleomargarines, syrups, 
etc., such as are used in all countries ; (2) 
natural, though unusual, substitutes, such 
as potato meal for flour, vegetable and 



227 



228 



Questions and Answers 



spice, or fish and vegetable mixtures for 
sausages, sweetened vegetable mixtures 
for jams, etc. ; (3) chemical substitutes, 
some of apparent utility, many of doubt- 
ful value, and some, no doubt, harmful 
such as fat extracts from chemical com- 
pounds, chemical sweetenings, and chemi- 
cal compounds aiming to give a more or 
less balanced artificial ration of proteids, 
carbohydrates, etc. ; (4) swindling sub- 
stitutes, which the Government prosecutes 
rigorously (more so than in times of 
peace even), but which thrive naturally 
owing to the craving of people for long- 
denied foods. Among such fraudulent 
substitutes were "soup cubes," which 
turned out to consist of 96 per cent cook- 
ing salt and 4 per cent coloring matter. 

Q. — Is Prussia much bigger than 
the other States? 

A. — Very much so. Prussia contains 
135,000 square miles, against the 29,000 
square miles of Bavaria, which is the next 
larger kingdom of the Federation. It 
has 40 million people as against Bavaria's 
7 million — that is, it compares in man- 
power with its nearest neighbor about 
the way the Middle Atlantic and Great 
Lakes States compare with the South At- 
lantic group. 

Q. — Have our States less popula- 
tion than Prussia? 

A. — No single American State com- 
pares with Prussia even remotely. Prus- 
sia has more population than New York, 
New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, 
Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin com- 
bined though in area it is not larger than 
New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. 

Q. — How do the people find room? 

A. — They live 224 to the square mile. 
This is a denser population than we have 
anywhere except Massachusetts, Rhode 
Island and New Jersey. 

Q. — Is the rest of Germany densely- 
populated? 

A. — Even more densely than Prussia. 
In Saxony, 829 people live to the square 
mile. No other German State quite equals 
that! But everywhere the populations 
range around 300 to the square mile. 

Q. — How can there be any room 

for farms? 

A. — There is plenty of room for farms 
and forests — but there is no room for wild 
lands, or waste lands, or unproductive 



lands. That density of population is one 
of the secrets of Germany's intensity in 
economical industries. The people had to 
do it, or starve, or emigrate. The result 
was intensive agriculture, intensive indus- 
try and now, alas, an all too intensive and 
"practical" deadliness of purpose in war. 

Q. — How does Germany's agricul- 
tural area compare with ours? 

A. — Germany has about 88 million acres 
arable land (farms, pastures, vineyards), 
as against more than 600 million acres in 
America, of which latter, however, only 
358 million are cultivated. 

Q. — How do we compare in farms 
with Germany? 

A. — We had more than 6 million farms 
in 1910 when the last census was made. 
In Germany, in 1907, the number of farms 
cultivated each by one household was 
5,736,000. Our farms, of course, were 
much larger than the German farms. 

Q. — What were the chief crops of 
Germany in peace? 

A. — The biggest crop was rye. The 
next biggest was hay. Then came oats, 
potatoes, wheat, barley and beets. The 
smaller crops were vines, tobacco and 
hops. 

Q. — Could human beings live on 
rye flour alone? 

A. — Yes. Indeed, dietary experts hold 
that while white wheat flour is one of 
the large elements for a perfect human 
diet, mankind (and especially Americans) 
would do well to use a great deal of rye 
flour and cut down heavily on the highly 
bolted and unnaturally whitened wheat 
flours. Rye flour is coarse, and this has 
an excellent effect on the intestines, which 
absolutely demand a certain amount of 
coarse material. For many generations 
the people of Germany, France, Switzer- 
land, etc., ate hardly anything except 
"black bread" — bread made from rye 
flour exclusively. 

Q. — What has German intensive 
agriculture done? 

A. — Statistics collected by Dr. Helf- 
ferich in 1913 show that the yield per acre 
of wheat, rye, oats, barley, potatoes, and 
hay has increased 77.7 per cent in twenty- 
five years ; and the aggregate yield of 
these crops increased 87.7 per cent, not- 
withstanding an increase of only 5.8 per 



! 



Germany (Food) 



229 



cent in their acreage. In all these crops 
Germany is getting a larger yield per 
acre than any other of the large agricul- 
tural countries. At the same time Ger- 
many has increased production of beet 
sugar about two-and-one-half fold. These 
remarkable results in agriculture are the 
more striking because the number of per- 
sons engaged in agriculture has remained 
practically stationary. 

Q. — Did the privileged classes in 
Germany escape food restric- 
tions? 

A. — Reliable observers say that the 
police in the large cities enforced the reg- 
ulations rigidly; the manager of one of 
the largest hotels in Berlin was sent to 
prison because he made the servants give 
up their butter allowances that he might 
have more to sell to guests. 

But at least up to the third year of the 
war the wealthy managed to live comfort- 
ably, since poultry, green vegetables and 
fruit were exempt from the card system. 
While geese and fowls and game were at 
very high prices, they could generally be 
secured. 

It was charged many times by German 
newspapers that whole communities, and 
the farmers as a class were persistently 
violating the laws. 

Q. — Is corn native to Europe? 

A. — Not if you mean what we call 
"corn" — the American plant which pro- 
duces its fruit in large cobs covered with 
a green sheath. This is one of the com- 
paratively few important foods that were 
added to the world's supply by the dis- 
covery of America, potatoes being the 
other great addition. 

In Europe the name of this western 
crop is maize, and that is the correct 
name. "Corn," in European terms, means 
wheat, rye, etc. 

Maize is raised quite extensively now 
through Europe, but it is nothing like 
the agricultural leader that it is in Amer- 
ica. 

Q. — What coffee substitutes were 
used in Germany? 

A. — Coffee substitutes were made of 
chicory (the root of the dandelion), burnt 
or roasted, and ground beans or crusts, 
vegetable husks, etc. "Chicory-coffee" is 
not an unusual substitute in Europe. 
Many of the French and German lower 
classes have preferred chicory even in 
peace times — indeed, many French people 
of the better classes hold that a certain 



proportion of chicory in coffee improves 
it. Chicory has a bitter flavoring element 
in it. It is, as a matter of fact, health- 
ful, but lacks the stimulating properties 
of coffee. The other substitutes, how- 
ever, are of qualities ranging from un- 
satisfactory to nasty. 

Q. — Can Germany get fed by Rus- 
sia? 

.A. — The food situation in Germany for 
given years preceding the war was as 
follows (each year): (1) Rye: enough 
produced for Germany's consumption and 
a small surplus to export. (2) Wheat: 
1/9 was imported from overseas and from 
Russia. (3) Barley: y 2 was imported al- 
most wholly from Russia. (Used for fat- 
tening pigs.) (4) Maize (corn) : % came 
from Russia and across the Atlantic. 
(Used for fattening pigs.) (5) Bran: 
imported 1% million tons, 1/4 from Rus- 
sia (for cow feed). (6) Oil-cake: im- 
ported l / 2 million tons from Russia and 
America (for cow feed). (7) Artificial 
nitrogenous manures : Yz came from Chile, 
none from Russia. (8) Rice: % imported 
from British India, none from Russia. 
(9) Eggs: half the supply from Russia 
and enemy countries. 

Q. — Has Russia accumulated any 
food-stuffs? 

A. — A considerable amount of various 
cereals have been stocked in Russia. Over 
the first three years of war this accumu- 
lation was about 24,000,000 tons. In 1917, 
about 8,000,000 tons were available. The 
production of food cereals, however, has 
declined steadily since 1915, and the cha- 
otic economic conditions, no doubt, have 
impeded the production considerably 
since March, 1917. The opening of the 
Russian food markets to Germany, no 
doubt, brought the German and Aus- 
trians some sorely needed relief in the 
early part of 1918, but nothing had then 
developed to prove that it could restore 
normal conditions in the Central Empires. 
Normally, the Ukraine wheat fields should 
be able to feed all Europe if they were 
cultivated with modern machinery. 

Q. — Can the Germans get much 
meat from Bulgaria? 

A. — They could not have obtained a 
great deal, although the Bulgars, during 
recent years, have devoted a good deal 
of attention to the raising of sheep. 
These had become so numerous that 
shortly before the war a beginning was 
made with a huge slaughterhouse and 
freezing establishment at Varna, from 



230 



Questions and Answers 



which mutton was to be exported to Tur- 
key, Greece, and even Egypt. Still, what 
would be over-abundance for the Bulgars 
would not go very far for Germany. 

Bulgaria had %y 2 million sheep in 1910, 
the date of the last animal census. Her 
cattle amounted to 1,600,000. Altogether 
she had about 12 million head of stock 
to 5 million population. Thus she had 
a surplus. 

Q. — Are there any figures on Ger- 
many's live stock? 

A. — According to the animal census in 
April, 1916, the number of cattle in Ger- 
many had been reduced to 19,900,000, and 
there were only 13,300,000 pigs left. A 
further census appears to have been taken 
in September, 1916, and shows a remark- 
able increase, especially in the number of 
pigs. The figures are as follows : 

Horned Apr. 15, Sept. 1, Inc. per 

Cattle. 1916. 1916. cent. 

Calves under 3 
months 1,974,434 1,982,891 0.4 

Young cattle, 3 
months-2 yrs. 6,092,718 6,307,504 4-6 

Bulls and oxen 
over 2 years.. 1,365,877 M5M22 6.2 

Cows and heif- 
ers over 2 yrs. 10,552,154 10,597,433 0.4 

Total 19,921,183 20,338,950 2.1 

Pigs. 

Under 6 months 9,055,382 11,204,976 23.7 

6-12 months 2,857,041 4,230,89048.1 

Over 12 months 1,424,779 1,825,242 28.1 



Total 13,337,202 17,261,108 29.4 

Q. — What live stock had Germany 

before war? 

A. — According to the official German 
figures there were in September, 1912, 20,- 



182,000 cattle ; in September, 1913, 20,994,- 
000. On those dates the numbers of pigs 
were 21,821,000 and 25,659,000 respectively. 

Q. — Did Germany have more live 
stock than other countries? 

A. — Germany had in 1916 about 50J/2 
million head of food-animals (cattle, 
sheep, swine, etc.) for a population of 
about 68 million. 

The United States had in 1917 about 
176 million head of live stock for a popu- 
lation of about 102 million. 

Of course, it must be remembered that 
the United States is a meat-exporting 
country, while Germany is not. 

Comparing Germany's live stock per 
head of population with that of non-ex- 
porting countries, we find : France, about 
29 million head of meat animals to 40 
million population ; United Kingdom 
(England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales), 
about 45 million head to 45 million popu- 
lation. 

Q. — How does German milk pro- 
duction per cow compare? 

A. — In the United States the average 
yield among 11 million cows is 420 gal- 
lons of milk per cow a year. In Den- 
mark (1,500,000 cows), the average yield 
per cow per year was 550 gallons before 
the war when feeding conditions were 
normal. In Germany before the war the 
average yield was 750 gallons per cow 
per year. 

Q. — What supplies has Austria- 
Hungary? 

A. — That empire, with a population just 
about the same as that of the United 
Kingdom, had, when the war broke out, 
17,000,000 cattle, 12,000,000 sheep, 13,000,- 
000 pigs, 3,500,000 horses, 2,000,000 goats. 



THE SELECTIVE DRAFT 

Q. — When was the selective draft of 600 an hour. It required 22 hours to 
law passed? complete the work. 



A. — The original "Select Service Law" 
is an Act of Congress, which came into 
full force May 18, 1917. The law is en- 
titled : "An Act to authorize the Presi- 
dent to increase temporarily the Military 
Establishment of the United States." Its 
purpose was the raising of troops to carry 
on the war against Germany. It was 
drawn to create a "National Army," and 
it called on all men from 21 to 30 in- 
clusive. 



Q. — When was the age limit ex- 
tended? 

A. — On August 31, 1918, when the 
President signed the new "man-power 
bill" calling on all men between 18 and 45 
to register on September 12, 1018. The 
law included all men who had attained 
their 18th birthday and who had not 
reached their 46th birthday on the day set 
for registration. 



Q. — What was the draft just pre- 
vious to the second law? 

A. — It was the draft of men who had 
reached 21. This was done under the 
original law which provided that as men 
became 21 they became liable to draft. 



Q. — When was the first drawing 
for the selective draft? 

A. — The official drawing of numbers to 
determine the men of the country to con- 
stitute the first draft for the National 
Army was July 20, 1917, in the Office 
Building of the United States Senate, in 
the presence of the Secretary of War, 
many army officers of high rank, Senators 
and Representatives and many citizens. 

Numbered slips incased in capsules 
were drawn by two blindfolded men and 
these were announced and unofficially 
transmitted over the country by the press. 
The official list was announced later by 
the Secretary of War. 

The first number drawn was 258. After 
that the numbers were drawn at the rate 



Q. — What was meant by the "mas- 
ter list"? 

A. — The drawing of numbers that was 
made in Washington under the direction 
of the Secretary of War took in numbers 
from 1 to 10,500 both inclusive. 

A schedule or master list was prepared 
by the Provost Marshal General contain- 
ing all of these numbers placed in the 
exact order in which they were drawn. 

The master list thus controlled the 
exact order in which the persons whose 
registration cards are in the possession 
of the respective Local Boards, or may 
hereafter be received by said Local 
Boards, are liable to be called by the Local 
Board for Military Service. 



Q. — Is provision made to notify 
families of boys in training 
camps if they are ill? 

A. — The American Red Cross has es- 
tablished in the camps and cantonments in 
the United States the service (already 
furnished in France) to keep families in 
America in personal touch with their boys, 
ill or wounded in the field. This action 
is in response to a request made by the 
Secretary of War, who wrote that "Amer- 
ican Red Cross representatives at the 
camps here, as in France, would have 
access to daily lists of admissions and 
evacuations from the hospitals, and, so 
far as it is in accord with necessary med- 
ical rules, would be allowed to talk with 
sick men. They would be expected to 
keep families constantly informed as to 
the condition and progress of men in the 
hospitals, to write letters for men unable 
to write themselves, and in general to ful- 
fill that clause of the Red Cross charter 
which designates the society as "a medium 
of communication between troops in the 
field and their families at home. ' 



Q. — Can a man be drafted who has 
had previous service? 



A. — Yes, he is a civilian and liable to 
draft. 



231 






232 Questions and Answers 

Q. — What is the ratio of death in Secretary Baker said: 

the U. S. Army? "The death rate in our forces in the 

y ' United States, from mid-September to 

A. — Figures compiled at the office of the end of December averaged 7.5 per 

Surg. Gen. William C. Gorgas, U. S. A., thousand, and is slightly less than would 

and made public on Dec. 29, 1917, show have been the death rate of men of the 

that with more than 900,000 soldiers in same age at home. In 1898 the death rate 

training in this country from Sept. 21 to per thousand was 20.14, or nearly three 

Dec. 14, there were only 1,391 deaths from times as great. Our death rate in the 

all causes, an average rate of less than Army during the year „I9i6, just before 

two per 1,000. Among the 202,009 Regu- the war, was five per thousand. Leaving 

lars there were 144 deaths. There were out the deaths due to measles and its com- 

494 deaths in the 387,233 National Army plications, our rate among all troops in 

and 753 deaths in the 327,480 National the United States since Sept. 1 has been 

Guardsmen. about two per thousand." 

Q. — Where are the draft army cantonments? 

Place. Name. Designation. 

Alexandria, La Camp Beauregard National Guard 

American Lake, Wash Camp Lewis National Army 

Annapolis Junction, Md Camp Meade Do. 

Anniston, Ala Camp McClellan National Guard 

Atlanta, Ga Camp Gordon National Army 

Augusta, Ga Camp Hancock National Guard 

Ayer, Mass Camp Devens National Army 

Battle Creek, Mich Camp Custer Do. 

Charlotte, N. C Camp Greene National Guard 

Chillicothe, Ohio Camp Sherman National Army 

Columbia, S. C. Camp Jackson Do. 

Deming, N. Mex Camp Cody National Guard 

Des Moines, Iowa Camp Dodge National Army 

Fort Riley, Kans Camp Funston Do. 

Fort Sam Houston, Tex Camp Travis Do. 

Fort Sill, Okla Camp Doniphan National Guard 

Fort Worth, Tex Camp Bowie Do. 

Greenville, S. C. Camp Sevier Do. 

Hattiesburg, Miss Camp Shelby Do. 

Houston, Tex Camp Logan Do. 

Linda Vista, Cal Camp Kearney Do. 

Little Rock, Ark Camp Pike National Army 

Louisville, Ky Camp Zachary Taylor Do. 

Macon, Ga Camp Wheeler National Guard 

Montgomery, Ala Camp Sheridan Do. 

Palo Alto, Cal Camp Fremont Do. 

Petersburg, Va Camp Lee National Army 

Rockford, 111 Camp Grant Do. 

Spartanburg, S. C Camp Wadsworth National Guard 

Waco, Tex Camp Mc Arthur Do. 

Wrightstown, N. J Camp Dix National Army 

Yaphank, Long Island, N. Y Camp Upton Do. 



Q. — What is the size of the aver- Q. — Has a decision been given on 

age American cantonment? the constitutionality of the Se- 

A.— A camp accommodating 37,000 men lective Draft Law? 

is about two miles in length and one and A.— Yes. The United States Supreme 

a half mdes in breadth. Each camp con- Court on January 7, 1918, passed seven 

tains about 1,600 buildings, the construe- cases arising under the selective draft 

tion of which requires 34,000,000 square j aw an d decided adversely to the men 

feet of lumber. For heating and lighting drafted, 
these camps, 400 miles of electric wiring 
and 60 miles of heating pipes were re- 
quired. 



The Selective Draft 



233 



Q. — What total number of Ameri- 
cans were subject to draft? 

A. — There were estimated to be in the 
United States fin round numbers) 10,000,- 
000 men between the ages of 21 and 30 
inclusive. This number represents very 
nearly 10 per cent of the estimated popu- 
lation of the country — between 103,000,000 
and 104,000,000. The figure was reached 
by estimating the number of males who 
had attained ages of 21 and 30, inclusive, 
since the date of the last census, April 15, 
1010. This basis of calculation proved 
wonderfully close. On the same basis it 
was estimated that the number affected 
by the second draft law was 12,780,000 in 
round numbers. 

Q. — How many registrants under 
the first draft were called? 

A. — The total number of registrants 
was 9,586,508. Of these 3,082,949, or 32.16 
per cent were called by the various regis- 
tration boards. Those not called num- 
bered 6,503,550, or 67.84 per cent of the 
total number of men between the ages 
of 21 to 30 who registered under the law. 
A total of 1,057,363 men were certified 
for service and 687,000 were named in 
the first call. 

Q. — How many of the men called 
by the first draft failed to ap- 
pear? 

A. — The total number of men called to 
colors was 9,586,508. Of these 252,294 
failed to appear. 

Q. — Were many drafted men re- 
jected at the camps? 

A. — The percentage of rejections at 
camp varied between 0.72 per cent and 
11.87 per cent, and, as the physical con- 
ditions of the men from the different 
regions cannot account for this, it is at- 
tributed to differences in strictness in the 
examinations by the camp surgeons. 

The valuable mass of data now latent 
in the record has not been studied in its 
entirety. But of 10,000 men spread over 
eight camps, the sources of defect show- 
ing the largest percentages were eyes, 
teeth, hernia, ears, heart disease and 
tuberculosis in the order given. 

Q. — What proportion of men went 
unwillingly? 

A. — "The actual state of mind, of 
course, cannot be known," says General 
Crowder, "but the filing of an unsuccess- 



ful claim for exemption or discharge is, 
at least, an index of unwillingness, and 
figures show that of the 1,057,363 certified 
for service, those who filed no claims for 
exemption were 639,054, or 60.44 per cent 
— the 'involuntary' conscripts being 418,- 
309, or 39.56 per cent." 

Q. — How many aliens were draft- 
ed? 

A. — A total number of 1,243,801 were 
registered. Of these, 772,744 were Allied 
aliens, 148,274 were neutral aliens, 40,663 
were enemy aliens, and 282,120 were allies 
of enemy aliens. The number called was 
457,713, and of this 76,545 were finally 
accepted for service — only 17 in a 
hundred. 

Q. — Is a man subject to draft if he 
becomes forty-six before the 
draft call? 

A. — This provision of the act reads, 
"Persons shall be subject to registration 
who shall have attained their 18th birth- 
day and who shall not have attained heir 
46th birthday on or before the day set for 
the registration, and all persons so regis- 
tered shall be and remain subject to 
draft." 

Q. — How many unmarried physi- 
cally fit men become twenty- 
one years of age each year? 

A. — The number of males arriving at 
the age of 21 each year is estimated to 
be 960,000. As shown by the percentages 
of acceptance in the first draft, this esti- 
mated proportion of those unmarried and 
physically fit will be 96 per cent unmar- 
ried, and 76.3 per cent fit physically. 

Q. — What had the first draft boards 
suggested about age limit? 

A. — The following suggestions had 
been made by a majority of the boards: 
that young men who are under age should 
come within the law when they reach the 
minimum draft age; that young men of 
18 or 19 years should be enrolled and 
trained so as to be ready for service : m- 
mediately upon attaining draft age : 19 
and 34 were the limits most frequently 
suggested, though some recommended 40 
to 45 years as the upper limit. There was 
a distinctly stronger demand for raising 
the maximum age than for lowering the 
minimum. Provost Marshal General Crow- 
der, discussing the enlargement of the age 
limits for selective military service said, 



234 



Questions and Answers 



early in 1918, that such suggestons had 
been made in his report to the Secretary 
of War. 

Q. — How many claims for exemp- 
tion were granted in the first 
draft? 

A. — Of the total number of men called 
for registration by the first draft (about 
3 million) 1,560,570, or 50.62 per cent, 
made claims for exemption. Of this 
number, 77.86 per cent were granted. 895,- 
150, or 73.99 per cent, were on the grounds 
of dependency; 228,452, or 19.67 per cent, 
were on the grounds of alienage; 3,877, 
or 0.34 per cent, were on religious 
grounds, and 2,001, or 0.17 per cent, were 
decided on grounds of moral unfitness. 

The state having the highest percent- 
age of claims allowed was Connecticut, 
and the lowest was Mississippi. 

Q. — What percentage of men are 
physically fit? 

A. — Using the results of the draft law 
as a basis, it is estimated that 76.3 per 
cent are physically fit. Of all the men 
called for physical examination by the 
draft, 730,756, or 23.7 per cent, were re- 
jected on account of physical deficien- 
cies. 

Q. — Were all the citizens in the 
first draft sent to the camps at 
once? 

A. — No. They were sent in increments, 
and early in 1918 72,000 men still re- 
mained to be assigned to cantonments. 
The full strength of men contemplated in 
the first draft was 687,000. The assign- 
ment of the full quota to camps was fin- 
ished March, 1918. 

Q. — Did the draft prove country 
boys superior to city boys? 

A. — The common belief that the aver- 
age of physical soundness is higher among 
country boys than among the city bred was 
not supported by the records of the selec- 
tive draft. 

For the purpose of comparison, selec- 
tion was made of a typical setof_ cities 
of 40,000 to 500,000 population distributed 
over ten different states, and a corres- 
ponding set of counties of the same total 
size, located in the same states and con- 
taining no city of 30,000 population. 

The total number of registrants in the 
two areas was 315,000. 

The comparison resulted as follows : Of 
35,017 registrants in urban areas, 9,969 



were rejected. Of 44,462 registrants from 
rural areas, 12,432 were rejected. In 
other words, 28.47 per cent of the city 
boys were rejected against 27.96 per cent 
of the country boys. 

Q. — How are local draft boards 
compensated? 

A. — Section 195, Selective Service Reg- 
ulation was repealed January 30th, 1918, 
and in lieu thereof the following was 
promulgated by the President : Section 195 
(Amended) Local Boards — Compensa- 
tion : 

"The rate of compensation for mem- 
bers of local boards up to and including 
the completion of the final classification 
of the registrants within the respective 
jurisdiction of said boards shall be on the 
basis of 30 cents as aggregate compensa- 
tion to the membership of a local board 
for each registrant to whom a question- 
naire shall have been mailed and who 
shall have been finally classified in ac- 
cordance with the provisions of these 
regulations. 

"Money due for said work shall be paid 
in proportionate amounts to each member 
of a local board claiming compensation 
for his service, unless it shall be requested 
by the unanimous vote of the local board 
that the moneys due should be paid in 
some other proportion. In such case no 
one member shall receive more than 15 
cents of the allowance of 30 cents for 
each classification, and no two members 
shall receive more than 25 cents for each 
classification to be distributed between 
them." 

Q. — What was the cost of the first 
selective draft? 

A. — The total cost of the first selective 
draft was $5,211,965.38. The number of 
registrants was 9,586,508, and the number 
of men called for examination was 3,082,- 
949. The cost per man called was $1.69. 
The number of men who were accepted 
was 1,057,363, making the cost per man 
finally accepted $4-93- 

Q. — What was the cost of Civil 
War recruiting? 

A.— General James B. Fry, Provost 
Marshal General, in a report, March 17, 
1866, said that the cost of recruiting men 
in the Civil War was $11,027,751.21 for 
168,649 men drafted, or $9.84 per man, as 
against the cost per capita of the 1917 
selective draft $4-93. making the Civil 
War system much higher. The money 
value of Civil War days also was much 
lower than now. 



The Selective Draft 



235 



Q. — Are answers made by draft 
registrants open to public in- 
spection? 

A. — The answers of any registrant con- 
cerning the condition of his health, men- 
tal or physical, in response to Series II 
of the questions under the head entitled 
"Physical Fitness," in the Questionnaire, 
and other evidence and records upon the 
same subject and the answers of any reg- 
istrant to the questions under Series X 
of the questions under the head entitled 
"Dependency" in the Questionnaire, ex- 
cept the names and addresses of the per- 
sons claimed to be dependent upon such 
registrant, shall not, without the consent 
of the registrant, be open to inspection by 
any person other than members of local 
and district boards, examining physicians, 
members of Medical Advisory Boards, 
Government Appeal Agents, and other 
persons connected with the administra- 
tion of the selective service law, and 
United States Attorneys and their assist- 
ants, and officials of such bureaus or de- 
partments of the United States Govern- 
ment as may be designated by the Secre- 
tary of War. 

Q. — May a man subject to draft go 
abroad ? 

A. — If a person is subject to draft, he 
does not need a passport from the State 
Department, if he wants to go to Canada. 
In that case he only needs a "permit" 
from a local board. For any other coun- 
try, he must apply to the local board for 
a permit. The local board investigates 
the case. If the person is not likely to 
be called within the period of the pro- 
posed absence, or if the board is other- 
wise assured that favorable action will 
not result in evasion of or interference 
with the execution of the law, the local 
board takes from the applicant his ad- 
dress while absent and issues a permit, 
which, if approved by the Provost Mar- 
shal General, entitles him to a passport 
from the State Department. 

Q. — What are the rules as to phys- 
ical unfitness? 

A. — Physical deficiencies must be pres- 
ent in such degree as clearly and unmis- 
takably to disqualify the man for mili- 
tary service. Much is left to the physi- 
cian's final judgment and discretion. 

Temporary effects of acute disease or 
of an injury are not regarded as justi- 
fying a finding that the person so affected 
is not physically qualified for military 
service. Such conditions justify a rea- 



sonable delay in completing the physical 
examination in order that an opportunity 
for recovery may be afforded. If the de- 
ficiency is of such a nature that the serv- 
ice in the army will improve the physi- 
cal condition of the selected man in gen- 
eral and eliminate the deficiency, the man 
is selected, entrained, and put into such 
kind of service as best fits his case. 

Q. — Can a drafted man demand 
that he be sent to France? 

A. — No registrant under the provision 
of the selective service law (and no vol- 
untary enlisted man) can make any con- 
dition that affects his service after he has 
been selected or after he has been ac- 
cepted for entrainment. The United 
States will not make any "proviso" to 
send any soldier or sailor anywhere at any 
time stipulated by the selected man or 
the volunteer. This rule applies to com- 
batant and non-combatant service alike 
(for instance Red Cross). 

Q. — How long after war will draft- 
ed men be held? 

< A. — It is reasonable to assume that en- 
listed and drafted men will not be held 
any longer in the service of the United 
States than is necessary for the safety 
of the_ country, and that soldiers and sail- 
ors will be sent home as quickly as de- 
mobilization can be effected after the war. 
The "Selective Service Law" provides 
that the selected men shall remain liable 
only four months after the conclusion of 
peace. 

Q. — Are skilled technical workers 
exempt from military service? 

A. — There are circumstances in which 
the need of military establishments for 
men expert or highly skilled is such that 
the national interest is better served by 
selecting such men into military service. 
The engagement in industry and agricul- 
ture is no reason for exemption. 

Q. — Is a man whose wife can sup- 
port herself and children 



exempt from draft? 



A. — The "Selective Service Law" ex- 
empts no person from military service on 
the ground of dependency. It only au- 
thorizes the exclusion or discharge from 
draft of "those in a status with respect 
to persons dependent upon them for sup- 
port which renders their exclusion or 
discharge advisable." 



236 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Was the first draft a thor- 
oughly selective one? 

A. — It was, of course, intended to raise 
our new army in a way to leave as many 
workers as possible on the farms, and to 
take men, as much as possible, from 
occupations which were not essential. 
While the full results, owing to the enor- 
mous problem and its total novelty, were 
not wholly reached by the draft boards, 
the table of numbers and percentages se- 
lected from different occupations will 
show how they approximated : 

Called. Accepted. Pet. 
Beverage industries 5,752 1,472 25^4 
Agriculture 782,503 205,731 26^ 

Forestry 24,507 7,984 32^2 

Clay, glass, etc 24,928 6,022 24 

Animal husbandry. 15,642 4,570 29 
General trade 111,541 24,892 22 

Q. — What can a person under age 
do if he registers by mistake? 

A. — He should report the case im- 
mediately to the local board. The board 
will investigate the claim that he is under 
age, and, if he is right, the local board 
is empowered to discharge him. 

Q. — Will the draft boards accept a 
man before his turn comes? 

A. — The men to be ordered into mili- 
tary service by a local board in filling any 
part of its quota are to be selected in the 
order of their liability within their class 
as shown on the classification list, in- 
cluding non-combatants. Any registrant 
whose order number is so early that, 
though not within the early part of the 
quota, he is within the total quota, may 
make application to the local board to be 
ordered into military service and en- 
trained with that part of the quota of the 
local board to be sent next after such ap- 
plication. 

If the granting of the application 
would increase the number ordered by the 
Adjutant General to be entrained by more 
than two men, the application will be de- 
nied. 

Q. — What will exempt from prose- 
cution a man who failed to 
register? 

A. — Being at sea on registration day 
and registering as soon as practical after 
landing, or when the person had been 
refused the opportunity to register by the 
local boards. 



Q. — Is a drafted man regarded as 
a deserter if he fails to report 
for the camps? 

A. — Persons who are selected for mili- 
tary service and who absent themselves 
with an intent to evade military service 
are deserters. 

They are reported to the police authori- 
ties and, if caught, are brought before 
the local board, which decides if the of- 
fense was willful or not. If not willful, 
the selected man is sent to a camp and 
the commanding officers of the camp fur- 
nished with all details of the case. If 
the offense is considered willful, the de- 
serter becomes subject to the military 
laws of the United States. 

Q. — How are drafted men sent to 
the camps? 

A. — Local boards procure one "party 
ticket" for the number of men who are to 
be sent. A leader is provided for the 
party. He keeps in his personal posses- 
sion the railroad and meal tickets of the 
party. He accompanies the conductor 
through the train, identifies the men of 
his party and, before delivering the ticket 
to the railroad agent or conductor, must 
indorse the ticket as to the correct num- 
ber of the men to whom transportation is 
furnished. 

The leader is responsible for the proper 
feeding of the party, and may not allow 
liquor to be sold to any of his men. Be- 
fore arrival at a mobilization camp he 
must inspect them to see that they are 
ready to leave the train, and that each 
man has attached to his lapel the badge 
given to him before starting. On arrival 
at the camp, the leader must hold his own 
group together until they are taken in 
charge by an officer or a non-commis- 
sioned officer, in whose hands he must 
safely deliver the mobilization papers of 
each and all of his men. 

Q. — How does the Government 
find out about a drafted man in 
a foreign country? 

A. — Either before or upon receiving a 
notice to report for physical examination, 
a registrant residing in a foreign country 
in a place too far for a journey to the 
United States may, at his own expense, 
apply by mail, cable or telegram to be 
physically examined by a nearby physi- 
cian appointed by the American Consul 
to make the examination. The consul 
must indorse his appointment upon the 
face of a "Form" sent to him by the local 
board in the United States residence of 



The Selective Draft 



237 



the applicant. The examination is made, 
the physician signs a detailed report, and 
the local board decides as to the physical 
qualifications of the registrant. 

Q. — Can a man appeal from the 
decision of a district board? 

A. — The decision of the district board 
is, in ordinary circumstances, final. A 
person may appeal to the President in in- 
dustrial and agricultural cases, when the 
appeal is accompanied by the written and 
signed recommendation of one member 
of the local board, and either the Gov- 
ernment Appeal Agent or the Adjutant 
General of the State. 

In dependency cases, the appeal must be 
accompanied by a signed statement of 
one member of the local board and either 
the Government Appeal Agent or an Ad- 
jutant General of the State certifying that 
the case is one of great and unusual hard- 
ship, stating the circumstances of hard- 
ship that will follow the going of the 
registrant into military service, and spe- 
cifically recommending a reconsideration 
of the case. 

The claim is examined first by the 
local board as to the compliance with the 
above rules, after which the local board 
forwards the claim to the Provost Mar- 
shal General. The President may rule, 
upon record of the case, that the appeal 
shall operate as a stay of induction into 
military service, pending further orders. 

Q. — How is any insufficient quota 
filled? 

A. — Immediately after the time of en- 
trainment the local board must proceed 
to call and entrain a sufficient number 
of selected men to fill the deficiency, if 
any, in its quota. 

_ Upon receipt of notice from the mobi- 
lization camp that any selected men of 
the contingent of a local board have 
been rejected, or, though entrained, have 
failed to reach such camp, the local 
board proceeds to call and entrain a suf- 
ficient number of selected men to fill va- 
cancies in its quota. Men sent to fill 
deficiencies get at least 24 hours' notice 
to appear for entrainment. 

Q. — Are feeble-minded persons ex- 
empt? 

A. — There are various degrees of 
feeble-mindedness. The Selective Serv- 
ice Law says that "lack of normal 
understanding" is a cause for rejection. 
What is meant by normal understanding 



is left in each case to the discretion of the 
examining physicians. 

Insanity, epilepsy, and organic nervous 
diseases are causes of rejection. 

Q. — Do men with bad teeth need 
to serve under the draft? 

A.— A man must have at least eight 
serviceable, natural masticating molars, 
four above and four below opposing, and 
six serviceable natural incisors, three 
above and three below opposing. These 
teeth must be so opposed that a person 
can cut his food and chew it. 

Teeth restored by crown or fixed bridge 
work, when such work is well placed and 
thoroughly serviceable, are considered as 
serviceable natural teeth. 

If dental work will restore the teeth to 
meet the requirements outlined in the pre- 
ceding paragraph, the man will be ac- 
cepted and sent to his cantonment, where 
dental work needed by him will be car- 
ried out. 

Q. — Is a man previously rejected 
by the Regular Army exempt? 

A. — Previous physical examinations are 
not considered valid in any case where 
the Selective Service Law is involved. 

Q. — How about defective eyesight? 

A. — In this case, the local board can 
rule that eyeglasses will correct the de- 
ficiency in vision. Men may be accepted, 
whose vision is 20/100 or better in each 
eye, correctable by appropriate lenses to 
20/40 or better in at least one eye, pro- 
vided no organic disease exists in either 
eye. 

Q. — Which officials are exempt 
from draft? 

A. — The Secretary to the President, 
heads of divisions of the various depart- 
ments of the government, members of 
Presidential boards, Interstate Commis- 
sions, Civil Service Commission, Federal 
Reserve Board, Federal Trade Commis- 
sion, Panama Canal Chief Officers, Sec- 
retary of the Smithsonian Institution, the 
Public Printer, Officers of the National 
Homes for Disabled Volunteers, Direc- 
tor General of the Pan-American Union, 
Vice-President of the United States, Sen- 
ators, Secretary, Sergeant-at-Arms, and 
Chaplain of the Senate. 

Representatives, Territorial Delegates, 
Resident Commissioners, Clerk, Door- 
keeper, Sergeant-at-Arms, Postmaster and 



2 3 8 



Questions and Answers 



Chaplain of the House of Representatives, 
the Superintendent of the Capitol. 

Librarian and the Superintendent of 
Buildings and Grounds of the Library of 
Congress. 

Judges, Clerks, Marshals and Reporters 
of the Supreme Court, the Court of 
Claims, Court of Customs Appeals, Cir- 
cuit Courts of Appeals, District Courts. 

Q. — Can a man be exempted on re- 
ligious grounds? 

A. — Any registrant found by a local 
board to be a member of any well-recog- 
nized religious sect or organization, or- 
ganized and existing May 18, 1917, whose 
then existing creed or principles forbid 
its members to participate in war in any 
form, and whose religious convictions are 
against war or participation therein in 
accordance with the creed or principles of 
said religious organizations, may be fur- 
nished by the local board with a certifi- 
cate to that effect and he can be required 
to serve only in a capacity declared by 
the President to be non-combatant. 

Q. — Can a farmer claim exemption 

from draft? 

A. — Any registrant found to be engaged 
in a "necessary" agricultural enterprise, 
and found to be "necessary" to such ^en- 
terprise in the capacity of sole managing, 
controlling, and directing head of the en- 
terprise, may be exempted. 

Q. — Will the draft law continue in 
effect after peace is made? 

A. — The "Selective Service Law" 
(draft law) is framed only "for the pe- 
riod of the war." The men selected are 
liable for that period, and for four 
months after peace is signed. 

Q. — Is an alien who has taken out 
his first citizenship papers sub- 
ject to draft? 

A.— By the Act entitled: "An Act, to 
authorize the President to increase tem- 
porarily the Military Establishment of 
the United States," approved May ^18, 
1917, the President was authorized "to 
draft into the Military Service of the 
United States, all male_ citizens or male 
persons, not alien enemies, who have de- 
clared their intention to become citizens, 
between the ages of 21 and 30 years, 
both inclusive." This authorized the 
drafting of all aliens other than German 
and Austrian. 



Q. — Are alien enemies exempt from 
registration? 

A. — Many persons confuse registration 
with draft. Each is a distinct process. 
Exemptions are granted after draft and 
not before. Even convicts and alien ene- 
mies (both of whom are exempt from 
draft) are obliged to register. There are 
no exceptions to the rule that all male 
persons in the United States between the 
ages of 18 and 45 inclusive must register, 
except those already in the Federal Mili- 
tary or Naval Service. 

Q. — What was the Alien Draft 
Bill? 

A. — It was a bill introduced by Senator 
Chamberlain in 1917 to draft into the 
Army aliens resident in the United States, 
and it was in response to a general de- 
mand that British, French, Italian and 
other subjects of the Allied Powers be 
obliged to give military service as Amer- 
ican citizens did. 

The bill was not pressed, because the 
State Department feared that it might 
lead to a great dispute about treaties, and 
impel Allied Powers to impress Ameri- 
cans then resident in their territories. 
The State Department, however, immedi- 
ately began diplomatic negotiations with 
the Allies. 

Q. — Was it intended to impress 
Germans and Austrians to 
fight their countries? 

A. — No. Such a suggestion was never 
even entertained. They were specifically 
excepted in the bill, and a clause pro- 
vided that they might be drafted for non- 
combatant work only. The chief purpose 
was to draft those Nationals on whose 
side the Tjnited States was fighting. 

Q. — What agreements were made 
finally to draft friendly aliens? 

A. — The conclusion of an agreement 
with Great Britain and Canada was an- 
nounced January 30, 1918, through a let- 
ter written by the Secretary of State to 
Vice-President Marshall as President of 
the Senate. The important provision of 
this agreement was that subjects of Great 
Britain or Canada were to have a stated 
time in which they might return to their 
own countries to serve. If they remained 
in this country beyond that time they 
would come under American draft regu- 
lations. 



The Selective Draft 



239 



Q. — What are non-essential occu- 
pations? 

A. — A ruling by the Provost Marshal 
General, effective July 1, 1918, declared the 
following to be non-useful occupations : 
(1) serving food and drink; (2) men op- 
erating passenger elevators, doormen, 
footmen, attendants in clubs, hotels, office 
buildings, etc.; (3) ushers, attendants at 
games, sports and amusements ; (4) do- 
mestic servicej (5) sales clerks. On July 
9, 1918, the Secretary of War ruled that 
baseball players were considered as en- 
gaged in non-essential occupation and if 
of draft age had to choose between mili- 
tary service or effective employment. 

Q. — What were the ages of men in 
the Civil War? 

A. — More than 2 million are said to 
have enlisted first and last who were un- 
der 21. More than a million of enlist- 
ments were under 18. Those from 15 to 
16 amounted to almost 850,000, according 
to one estimate. The men of 18 were 
found to make excellent soldiers. 

Q. — How many men were drafted 
in August? 

A. — On August 8, 1918, under the orig- 
inal Selective Draft and before the second 
bill had been enacted into law, the Provost 
Marshal General called 130,207 to join the 
colors before the end of August. This, it 
was calculated, would bring the total 
number of men called in August, 1918, to 
300,000 men. 

Q. — Are women alien enemies? 

A. — The term "alien enemy," as at pres- 
ent defined by statute, includes all na- 
tives, citizens, denizens, or subjects of a 
foreign nation or government with which 
war has been declared, being males of the 
age of fourteen years and upward who 
shall be within the United States and not 
actually naturalized as American citizens. 

Females were not alien enemies within 
the statutory definition ; but a succeeding 
regulation under the Espionage Act ex- 
tended its provisions to them. 

Q. — Is an alien who has taken out 
first citizenship papers classed 
as an alien enemy? 

A. — The Department of Justice author- 
izes the statement under the definition of 
alien enemy, Section 3: "A male native, 



citizen, denizen or subject of a foreign 
nation or government with which war 
has been declared is an alien enemy, even 
though he has declared his intention to 
become a citizen of the United States by 
taking out first papers of naturalization 
or has been partly or completely natural- 
ized in any country other than the United 
States." Thus a German who had, let us 
say, become a citizen of Mexico (a neu- 
tral country) would still be considered an 
alien enemy. 

Q. — What is the best way to send 
presents to France? 

A. — Money may be sent at domestic 
rates, payable at a "United States Mail 
Agency in France." In drawing order 
the office of payment should be desig- 
nated as "U. S. Army Postal Service," 
and in the coupon the name of the payee 
should be followed on the next line by 
the regiment and company, or other or- 
ganization to which the payee belongs. 

The original regulation was that all 
articles admissible to the domestic par- 
cel post might be sent to the Expedition- 
ary Forces overseas, on requests endorsed 
by soldiers' commanding officers, if care- 
fully packed and properly addressed, and 
if they did not include intoxicants, 
poisons, inflammable articles (including 
friction matches), or compositions which 
might kill or injure another or damage 
the mails. This regulation was sus- 
pended in the early part of 1918 to pre- 
vent congestion on the ships. 

Q.— How does America protect its 
soldiers financially? 

A. — The government provides a com- 
pensation of $25 a month to the wife 
(during widowhood), child, or widowed 
mother of any man killed or permanently 
disabled in the line of duty. 

In addition, Congress authorized, on 
October 6, 1917, the offering of insur- 
ance, secured by the government, to all 
officers, enlisted men, and members of 
the nurse corps in the Army and Navy 
who should apply before February 12, 
1918 (this time being afterwards ex- 
tended to April 12th) — or within 120 days 
after enlistment. 

Q. — Are all soldiers eligible to gov- 
ernment insurance? 

A.— This bill makes all officers and men 
in both branches of the service eligible. 



240 



Questions and Answers 



The policies range from $1,000 to $10,000, 
and the age limit is 15 to 65. The prem- 
ium is based on age ; a man of 30 on a 
$1,000 policy pays 69 cents a month, etc. 
The policy is payable in monthly instal- 
ments to the insured, if wholly disabled, 
and to the heirs, at his death. 

Q. — What are the Government In- 
surance provisions? 

A. — Annual renewable term insurance 
for the period of the war, with the option 
of changing to some other form within 
five years after the close of the war. It 
was not attachable or assignable. 

Each $1,000 gave $5.75 a month for 20 
years to the beneficiary — who might be 
wife, husband, child, grandchild, brother, 
sister, adopted brother or sister, step- 
brother or sister, parent, grandparent, 
step-parent or parent-in-law. 

The amount taken could be from $1,000 
to $10,000, the premium ranging from 65 
cents a month for each $1,000 at the age 
of 21, to 70 cents at 31, 82 cents at 41, 
and so on. 

Q. — Was protection limited to in- 
juries in line of duty? 
A. — No. It was unlimited by any such 



provision. Even those who might leave 
the service could still carry it — with the 
condition that within five years after the 
close of the war they must change to an- 
other form. 

Q. — Did the men take advantage 
of the insurance offer? 

A. — They did so enthusiastically that 
by February 18, 1918, over a million men 
had been insured for a total of $8,879,104,- 
000. 

Q. — What percentage of the men 
took insurance? 

A. — More than 90 per cent. On Au- 
gust 30, 1918, the Treasury Department 
announced that more than 30 billions of 
insurance had been written. Approxi- 
mately 3,400,000 insurance applications 
had been recevied to that date. It was 
estimated unofficially that the United 
States Army was more than 90 per cent 
insured. New men joining the colors 
were availing themselves almost without 
exception of the maximum insurance pro- 
tection authorized by law, namely $10,000. 



OUR FIRST YEAR OF WAR 
(April 6, 1917-April 6, 1918) 



Q. — What was the vital problem 
before us when we entered 
war? 

A. — Newton D. Baker, Secretary of 
War, expressed it as follows in a state- 
ment made at the end of the first Ameri- 
can war year: 

"Our task was to co-ordinate Man- 
Power with Munition-Power and adapt 
both to what we may call Tonnage-Power 
in order to arrive at our final result — 
War-Power. 

"To realize our Man-Power program 
without upsetting our Munition-Power 
program and at the same time not let 
either get too far ahead of our Tonnage- 
Power, was the problem which we set 
about to solve. 

"The Selective Draft recommendations 
were submitted to Congress as represent- 
ing the fairest, most economical and 
speedy method of raising our armies. 
Congress without delay recognized the 
wisdom of the measure and on May l8th 
the President signed the Selective Service 
Act. On June 5th, nearly ten million men 
between the ages of 21 and 31 years, reg- 
istered for service. We were thus assured 
of an inexhaustible supply of men." 

Q. — Did we succeed in quartering 
all the men we drafted? 

A. — The achievement of preparing to 
encamp and train all these men has been 
declared one of the most extraordinary 
feats ever accomplished. 

In three months, the Cantonment Divi- 
sion of the Quartermaster General's De- 
partment built 16 cantonments, each one 
practically a small city, each comprising 
about 1,400 separate buildings and pro- 
viding quarters for 47,000 men. 

Q. — What did the cantonment 
building involve? 

A. — In the construction of the 16 can- 
tonments, more than twenty-two thousand 
very varied buildings had to be erected 
to provide for the innumerable needs of 
the men in training. 

About 650,000,000 feet of lumber was 
used, and more than 80,000 carloads of 
materials and furnishings had to be 
shipped to the widely scattered localities. 



All the buildings were constructed so that 
they can be used continually for many 
years. 

Q. — What was the largest camp? 

A.— The largest cantonments were Camp 
Lewis near Tacoma and Camp Funston 
at Fort Riley, Kan. 

Q. — Were the officers trained in 
these camps? 

A. — Only incidentally, through their 
work after they had their commissions 
and were assigned there. Civilians who 
wanted to earn officers' commissions in 
the new National Army got their first 
training in special camps knows as Of- 
ficers' Training Camps. There were 16 
of these. 

Q.— How many officers did the Of- 
ficers' Training Camps turn 
out? 

A. — The first camp opened May 15th, 
IQ17, and during three months 44.000 can- 
didates for commissions underwent stiff 
training and tests. Of these candidates, 
27,341 men qualified for officers' commis- 
sions. A second series of camps was 
opened at once and about 23,000 men were 
admitted. Of these 17,237 won commis- 
sions on November 27th. A third large 
class earned commissions in January, 
1918, and before the end of our first year 
of war an adequate supply of well-trained 
and competent men was assured. 

Q. — Just how greatly did we in- 
crease our army in the first 
year? 

A. — The Secretary of War, reviewing 
the first year's work, said : 

"The Regular Army was rapidly in- 
creased from 5,791 officers and 121,797 en- 
listed men to io,6q8 officers and 503,142 
enlisted men ; the National Guard in Fed- 
eral Service, from 3,733 officers and 76,- 
713 enlisted men to 16,893 officers and 
431.583 enlisted men ; the Reserve Corps 
in active service, from 4,000 enlisted men 
to 96,210 officers and 77,360 enlisted men. 

"In other words, the Army of the 
United States has increased in actual 



.'I 



242 



Questions and Answers 



strength since April 6th, 1917, from 9.524 
officers, and 202,510 enlisted men to 123,- 
801 officers and 1,528,924 enlisted men." 

Q. — How soon did we send men 
abroad? 

A. — Within 10 weeks after we declared 
a state of war, the first American con- 
tingent landed safely in France. 

Q. — Was there a system for select- 
ing men for their best quali- 
ties? 

A. — A vast system of analysis was 
adopted and put into operation known as 
the "occupational census." 

Q. — How was it obtained? 

A. — By establishing at each cantonment 
a big organization of men who had ex- 
perience in vocational service. The pre- 
vious occupation, educational qualifications 
and even the preference for service of 
each enlisted man were recorded on in- 
dividual cards. The records were classi- 
fied, analyzed, filed, and the data collected 
was given to the Divisional Commanders, 
thus enabling them to make the best pos- 
sible assignment. 

Q. — Did we succeed in preventing 
illness? 

A. — We succeeded wonderfully. By 
the end of our first year of war we were 
able to say that the huge army of drafted 
men had not only escaped the disease 
which formerly was such a dreaded result 
of forming armies, but that they had ac- 
tually improved wonderfully in health, 
weight and strength. 

Q. — How big was our Medical De- 
partment? 

A. — In April, 1918, after the first year 
of war, this branch had 18.000 officers and 
98,000 enlisted men. At the beginning of 
the war there were 373 Army Nurses. 
The fuli complement called for 24,126 and 
it was contemplated to have 39,000 nurses 
called ultimately. 

Q. — What is the scope of the ar- 
my's Medical Department? 

A. — First the organization of base and 
field hospitals, as weH as general and 
highly specialized work in modern pathol- 
ogy, therapeutics and surgery. By scien- 
tific care they must keep the troops in 
fighting trim, for this is even more im- 



portant than mending the wounded. The 
Medical Department also is responsible 
for the inspection of all food supplies, the 
study of the true nutritive value of rations 
under different climatic and working con- 
ditions, as well as the stamping out of 
infectious and preventable disease, etc. 
A new and highly important branch that 
was established is the "Division of Psy- 
chology." 

Q. — What is the Division of Psy- 
chology? 

A. — It studies the men mentally. It 
thus assists in the selection of men men- 
tally qualified for important duties and it 
weeds out the unfit. This scientific super- 
vision strengthens the fighting units by 
discovering beforehand what men are not 
strong enough to stand the strain of bat- 
tle, and these are assigned to duties they 
can fill. 

Q. — What was done for the moral 
well-being of the drafted men? 

A. — The War Department assumed the 
responsibility for their morals and gen- 
eral spiritual condition. The Commission 
on Training Camp Activities was created 
"to "supply the normal ties of life to nearly 
a million and a half young men in training 
camps, to keep the environs of these camps 
clean and wholesome and to rationalize as 
far as it can be done, the bewildering en- 
vironment of a war camp." 

Recretive athletic work, camp singing, 
co-operative stores, and library facilities 
were in full swing by April, 1918, and 
there was systematic education on sex 
hygiene. The suppression of vice and of 
alcoholism in big areas around each camp 
was a highly successful part of this work. 

Q. — Were our first troops abroad 
supplied with American heavy 
artillery? 

A. — Secretary Baker said in regard to 
this: "It was proposed to us _ that to ex- 
pedite the equipment of American Armies 
in France and assure the maximum de- 
velopment of the munition supply with a 
minimum strain on available tonnage, 
French and British gun factories should 
supply our needs, and this was done with- 
out placing any undue burden on their 
war industry." 

Q.— Did the French and British 

succeed in supplying our men? 

A.— The Secretary of War says that 



Our First Year of War (April 6, igiy — April 6, 1918) 



243 



their production of field, medium and 
heavy artillery was so great that all Amer- 
ican divisions arriving in France through- 
out 1918 could be equipped with the best 
type of British and French guns and 
howitzers. 

Q. — What facilities did we have for 
producing big guns? 

A. — We had great facilities as is shown 
by the fact that from the middle of Aug- 
ust, 1914, to the middle of June, 1917, 
the British Government placed orders in 
America for ammunition and ordnance 
costing about $1,308,000,000. During seven 
months ending December, 1917, the War 
Department made 63,000,000 shells worth 
nearly $1,000,000,000 and gave orders 
amounting to nearly $1,500,000,000, for 
guns and munitions. 

In the first year after our entrance into 
war, the Ordnance Department averaged 
20 contracts a day with a daily expendi- 
ture of $6,000,000. 

Q. — How much artillery were we 
producing at the end of our 
first year? 

A. — "After 10 months of war we had 
begun to produce an amount equal to fully 
50 per cent of the amount of artillery pro- 
duced in France," is a statement made 
with official sanction on April 6, 1918. 

Q. — How many small arms were we 
producing? 

A. — September, 1917, we produced 2,500 
rifles weekly. By the end of October we 
were producing 5,000. In November, 1917, 
we produced 7,500, in December 8,500 and 
in March, 1918, we had reached a weekly 
production of 11,550 in three private fac- 
tories alone, while the great Government 
arsenals were producing in March, 1918, 
as follows : Springfield Arsenal CMassa- 
chusetts) 1,000 a day; Rock Island Ar- 
senal (Illinois), 500 a day. 

Q. — What was our output of small 
arms ammunition? 

A. — In February, 1918, we had reached 
a monthly production of 125 million 
rounds. 

Q. — How was our General Staff or- 
ganized? 

A. — A "War Council" was established 
and an important change made in the Gen- 



eral Staff providing for five assistant 
chiefs each responsible for a certain part 
of the work of the military establishment. 

Q. — How much had we expended 
for aviation? 

A. — For the army alone we appropriated 
as follows: on July 24, 1917, Congress 
voted $640,000,000 for the Air Service; a 
total of $744,000,000 was provided for the 
fiscal year and $1,032,000,000 had been 
asked for 1918^1919. 

Q- — How did our navy increase in 
the first year of war? 

A.— Figures issued in April, 1918, made 
the following comparison: 

Strength on April 6, 1917 

Regular Navy 64,680 4,366 69,046 

Marine Corps 13,266 426 13,692 

77,946 4,792 

Strength of Auxiliary Branches as called 
into service at beginning of war: 

Naval Reserve Force (approxi- 
mately) 10,000 

National Naval Volunteers (ap- 
proximately) 9i ooo 

Coast Guard 4,500 

m War strength in 1918 
(This is not quite up to the end of the 
first year. The navy had grown after the 
figures were prepared.) 

Enlisted Men Officers Total 

Regular Navy .. 191,709 7,781 199,490 
Naval Reserve 

force 78,19s 10,033 88,228 

Marine Corps... 38,512 1,434 39,946 
National Naval 

Volunteers ... 15,000 822 15,822 

Coast Guard 4,250 639 4,889 

327,666 20,709 

Total, officers 

and men 348,375 

Q- — What was the actual increase 
shown by these figures? 

m A. — Naval Reserve Force, 78,000 ; Na- 
tional Naval Volunteers, 6,800; Regular 
Navy, 130,444; Marine Corps, 26,254. 

Q. — What other naval increases 
were there? 

A. — The Hospital Corps increased from 
1,600 to over 8,000. Mechanics employed 



244 



Questions and Answers 






in navy yards increased from 35,000 to 
66,000. There were added, also, 7,000 ci- 
vilian employees at navy yards. Civilian 
employees in the Navy Department in- 
creased from 700 to 1,800; and in addi- 
tion 1,200 reservists were on duty in the 
Department. There were 1,397 midship- 
men in the Naval Academy, Annapolis, 
Md. The personel of the naval service, 
with the 350,000 officers and enlisted men 
amounted to more than 425,000 persons. 

Q. — How much money did we 
spend on the navy? 

A.— At the end of the first year of war, 
the account stood as follows: 

Appropriations 

Act of August 29, 1916 $312,888,060.25 

Act of March 4, 1917 516,491,802.08 

Act of June 15, 19*7 514,805,033.87 

Act of October 6, 1917 561,436,023.50 

$1,905,620,919.70 

Appropriations Pending 
Urgent Deficiency Bill.. $ 66,321,672.00 
Naval Appropriation Act 1.270,595.65504 

$1,336,917,327 04 

Further authority to incur 
obligations to $34,264,000.00 

Total $3,276,802,346.74 

Q. — How does this compare with 
what we used to spend? 

A. — According to the Navy Year Book 
for 1916 (government publication), we 
had spent altogether $3,367,160,591 for all 
naval purposes from 1794 to 1916. Thus, 
the total of appropriations for the fiscal 
year 1917, those made during 1917 and 
those pending in April, 1918, was within 
$90,358,245 of the total expenditures of 
the Navy from 1794 to 1916, inclusive. 

Q. — What did we do to train sail- 
ors? 

A. — To train and house men pi the 
Navy and Marine Corps we provided in 
the first year twenty huge camps. The 
Jamestown Exposition site on Hampton 
Roads, near Norfolk, Va., was made into 
our first Fleet Operating Base. The San 
Diego, Cal., and Gulfport, Miss., exposi- 
tion grounds were taken over and con- 
verted into camps. The_ Great Lakes 
Training Station, near Chicago, was en- 
larged to accommodate 20,000 men. Older 



stations, like that at Newport, R. I., were 
expanded, and new stations were erected 
at Pelham Bay, N. Y., for 10,000 reserves ; 
at Charleston for 5,000 men ; at Cape May, 
N. J., and several other points. A great 
new camp for Marines was established at 
Quantico, Va., for 8,500 men. 

Q. — How many destroyers did we 
build in the first year of war? 

A. — The number and details can not be 
given, but Josephus Daniels, Secretary of 
the Navy, said in a review of the first 
year of war that the United States "is 
now building more destroyers than there 
were in any other two navies before 1914, 
and constructing them in half the_ time 
which had been customary in peace times." 

Q. — What had we done in mer- 
chant ship building? 

A. — At the end of the first year of war 
we had begun to deliver ships in steadily 
increasing ratio and there was positive 
assurance that we should soon reach the 
"quantity production" which we actually 
did reach by July, 1918. The delivery of 
ships already, was well under way by April 
6, 1918. In January 11 steel vessels with 
a dead-weight tonnage of 91,441 were de- 
livered, in February 16 vessels with a 
dead-weight tonnage of 123,100. Ten ves- 
sels with a tonnage of 82,300 had been 
delivered early in March, and before the 
end of the first year of war enough more 
were delivered to bring the added new 
tonnage to almost 200,000. 

Q. — How many shipyards did we 
have by April, 191 8? 

A. — Built or in course of construction 
there were 30 new steel shipyards with a 
total of 203 shipbuilding ways. This, with 
37 yards already existing, made an aggre- 
gate of 67 steel shipyards with a total of 
398 building ways. Thirty-five yards with 
258 ways were on the Atlantic and Gulf 
coasts — 19 with 66 ways on the Pacific and 
13 with 74 ways on the Great Lakes. The 
37 existing yards had increased their ship- 
building ways from 162 to 195. There 
were also 332 launching ways built or in 
process of construction for wooden ships. 
Up to March 1st, 1918, 281 keels for 
wooden and composite vessels were laid. 

Q. — What tonnage did these keels 
represent? 

A. — On March 1st, 1918, the total dead- 
weight tonnage of Ferris Standard 35,000- 



Our First Year of War {April 6, ig 17 — April 6, 19 18) 245 



ton ships alone whose keels had been laid, 
amounted to 866,500 tons. Ferris ships 
under construction in all parts of the 
country then made a total of 1,123,500 
tons. To this were added the other steel 
ships and the wooden and composite ships. 

Q. — What full tonnage capacity 
had the new yards? 

A. — It was calculated that the 67 steel 
yards should turn out 7,000,000 dead- 
wefght tonnage of steel merchant ships 
every year. Enough wooden ship tonnage 
was expected to make a total of 0,300,000 
dead-weight tonnage yearly capacity when 
the yards were finished. They were 70 
per cent completed at the end of our first 
year of war. 

Q. — How many men were engaged 
in ship building? 

A. — In March, 1918, there were 170.589 
engaged in actual ship construction. 
Enough others were busy in yard con- 
struction, etc., to bring the whole number 
up to 236,000. This was against_ 45,000 
men engaged in 1916 in all the shipyards 
of the country. 

Q. — What are the Shipyard Volun- 
teers ? 

A. — The U. S. Shipyard Volunteers is a 
reserve organization of skilled mechanics, 
who stand ready to go to the shipyards 
when called. 

On January 28th, 1918, a drive to enroll 
250,000 skilled mechanics in the U. S. 
Shipyard Volunteers was started, calling 
on men from every line of industry who 
could develop into good shipworkers. By 
March 1, 1918, the enrollment was almost 
full. 

Q. — How had we taught these men 
to build ships? 

A. — An instruction training center was 
established at Newport News, Va., and 
247 skilled mechanics, selected from 22 
yards, were detailed for a six weeks' 
course of intensive training, to fit them as 
instructors for recruits brought into the 
shipyards. One hundred and fifteen of 
these, representing 16 trades, Tiad com- 
pleted the course by April, 1918, and had 
been sent out as instructors. The men 
taking this instruction course would, it 
was estimated, be able to train 37,000 men. 



Q.— How will our shipbuilding 
compare with the world's pro- 
duction ? 

A. — Edward N. Hurley, Chairman of 
the United States Shipping Board, said in 
a survey of the first year's work: "The 
Hog Island shipyard with 50 ways build- 
ing 8,000-ton ships, when it is organized 
and running to its maximum capacity, will 
turn out in one year 55 per cent of the 
greatest amount of tonnage which Great 
Britain has ever turned out in any single 
year. Her maximum output was in 1913, 
when she built 688 merchant vessels — rep- 
resenting 2,898,229 dead-weight tons. Hog 
Island, when running at full capacity 
should turn out 1,600,000 deadweight tons 
a year from materials fabricated in differ- 
ent parts of the country, brought into the 
yard on freight cars, and run to fthe ways 
and then put together.' 

Q. — What is the Fuel Administra- 
tion? 

A. — It is a department created by Act 
of Congress to assure "an adequate supply 
and equitable distribution" of fuel. Its 
central administration is in Washington 
and the organization extends to every 
State, to the District of Columbia and to 
Cuba. The state organizations reach into 
all the counties and even the communities, 
so that, in every section where coal is 
mined or consumed, a relation is estab- 
lished with the United States Fuel Ad- 
ministration. 

Q. — Were we producing enough 
transport equipment? 

A. — By April, 1918, factories were turn- 
ing out 1,000 war-trucks (carrying 3 to 5 
tons) a month. We had placed orders for 
6,500 three-ton trucks and 3,100 one-and- 
one-half-ton trucks for supply trains ; 
3,812 motor ambulances ; 4,000 trucks for 
engineers; 7,900 three-and-one-half-ton 
and one and one-half-ton trucks for the 
Signal Corps ; 7,500 four-wheel drive 
three-ton trucks for ordnance, 9,000 two- 
ton trucks, 2,000 one-ton trucks and 2,350 
light trucks, all for the ordnance service. 
Besides these we had ordered an immense 
amount of miscellaneous transport equip- 
ment, such as 251 tank-trucks ; 400 motor- 
cars, 7-passenger; 2,409 motor-cars, 5- 
passenger ; 238 motor-cars, 2-passenger ; 
4,210 motor-cycles with side car ; 700 
motor-cycles, solo ; 9,003 bicycles ; 14 
cargo-trailers for tractors, and 388 cargo- 
trailers for trucks. 



POPULATIONS AND RELIGIONS 

O. What is the population of the whom there were 10,000 or 11,000. Chil- 

TT •<• A Qt-+-, e ? ^ren are n °t included in these figures. 

unitea Dtar.es. 0f this total of 75>000> 21,000, principally 

A. At the census of 1910 the total women, were repatriated, or allowed to go 

population was 91,972,266, of whom 81,- to other countries; this left 54.000. Of 

732,000 were whites and 9,828,000 were these 32,000 had been interned, leaving 

negroes. The Indians numbered 308,000. 22,000 un-interned. Of the un-interned, 

The total foreign-born population was, in 4000 belong to friendly races, viz., Alsa- 

that year, 13,515,886. Of these, 2,501,181 tians, Italians from the Trentino, Czechs, 

had been born in Germany, 1,602,702 in and the like. 
Russia, 1,352,151 in Ireland 1,343,070 in 

Italy, 1,174,924 in Austria, 1,201,143 in Q. — How many Germans are there 

Canada, 876,455 in England, and 665,183 j n Brazil? 

in Sweden. The present population of . „,, , , . . _ .. . 

tlie United States is estimated at a little A.-The total population of Brazil is 

v>ii i«_ u w not accurate i y known, but it is estimated 

more than 102,000,000. at 24400000 y Between 1820 and 1907 

^ TT a.' ^ 1 ...» r*«- 93,ooo German immigrants reached the 

Q.— How many native-born Ger- ^ untry> and there has s been a slow influx 

mans and Austnans are in s j nce i n IQI2( f or instance, the immi- 

America? grants from Germany numbered 5,773. 

t Practically all the Germans live in the 
A.— According to the Federal census ot Southern provinces, and the total num- 
1910 (the last official and authoritative ber of Brazilians of German parentage is 
enumeration made in the United Mates) estimated to be about 400,000. Some- 
there were the following native-born Aus- timeS( it is iven as half a mil H n. 
trians, Germans and Hungarians in the 
United States:— q — j) the Germans live in sepa- 

Native Austrians 1, 174.973 rate communities? 

Native Germans 2,501333 A .-They live for the most part in 

Native Hungarians 495.6Q9 geparate c y omrnunit i e s, though there is 

T . , . 17 , QI r considerable intermarriage. Their pres- 

1 otai ; 7 ' ,y 3 ence, and that of the Italians, who are 

Of native-born Americans, with one or still more numerous, has made the south- 
both parents born in Germany or Aus- ern provinces of Brazil far the most pros- 
tria-Hungary, there were at that time in perous. 

the United States:— -».-*, , , , . 

Americans with one or both Q— Do they take much share in the 

parents born in Austria.... 826,635 government of the provinces 

Americans with one or both where they dwell? 

parents born in Germany 5 ,78i,437 A ._ They are most numer ous in the 

A ^ntf h Jn in Hnn^rv 204627 Prince of Rio Grande do Sul, their 

parents born in Hungary.. .. 204,627 £ umber ther£ bdng estimated at 250000 

Total 6812699 " The y form " sa y s Lord Br y ce : of G ^ a } 

xul,xl ' =" Britain, "a compact community which 

This gives a total of native-born Ger- preserves its national habits and man- 
mans and Austro-Hungarians and their a ges its own affairs with little inter- 
children of the first generation of 10,- ference by the central Government. It 
984,614. is, in fact, disposed to resent any such 

interference, and to 'run things' in its 

Q. — How many Germans were liv- own solid German way." Hiram Bing- 

ing in England when the war ham who is an English authority in 

- & , ? South American matters, said in 191 1 : 

brofce out." - The Germans in Southern Brazil are a 

A— H. Samuel, on June 29, 1916, gave negligible factor in international affairs, 

the following figures :— At the beginning but the well-educated young German who 

of the war there were 75,000 Germans is being sent out to capture South Amer- 

and Austrians living in the United King- ica commercially is a power to be reck- 

dom, excluding British-born wives, of oned with. He is going to damage Eng- 

246 



Populations and Religions 



247 



land more truly than dreadnaughts or 
gigantic airships." 

Q. — It is said that for ten years 
there had been 400,000 German 
Reservists in Rio Grande do 
Sul and Sao Paulo. Is that so? 

A. — The number of people of German 
descent in Brazil is less than half a mil- 
lion, according to official statements by 
the Brazilian Government. This being 
the case, it is impossible that there could 
be anything like 400,000 Germans of 
fighting age there. The immigration of 
Germans — men, women and children — 
into Brazil during the last ten years has 
averaged less than 4,000 per annum. 
These figures would appear still further 
to minimize any possible number of re- 
servists — that is, men trained in the Ger- 
man army. 

Q. — What is the birth rate in 
the fighting countries? 

A. — In 1912, it was 19 per thousand. 
The death rate was 17.5. Even in the first 
six months of 1914, there were no less 
than 17,000 fewer births in France than 
there were deaths. Since the war began 
the number of marriages has fallen off 
greatly. For the last six months of 1914, 
these totalled only 43,585, as against 122,- 
754 for the last six months of 1913. This 
is a decrease of no less than 65 per centl 
From April to August, 1915, there were 
one-fifth fewer births in the 26 largest 
German cities than during the same time 
in 1914. The British Registrar-General 
reports that the birth rate in Great Britain 
for the second quarter of 1915 was the 
lowest since civil registration was estab- 
lished. 

Q. — Is the French population 
chiefly agricultural or indus- 
trial? 

A. — More than one-sixth of the whole 
population is engaged normally in manu- 
facturing industry. This is without 
counting those engaged in affairs closely 
related to manufactures, such as mining, 
quarrying, transportation, etc. Counting 
these in, the total represents almost one- 
fifth of the population. The Frenchmen 
engaged in commerce number less than 
one-half of those in manufacturing in- 
dustries. The people engaged in agri- 
culture and forestry represent another 
one-fifth of the total population. Thus 
agriculture and manufacture lead about 



evenly in France. A curious fact is that 
less than 2 per cent of the population is 
enumerated as among the "liberal pro- 
fessions," meaning law, medicine, liter- 
ature, art, etc. 

Q. — Has the German birth-rate 
fallen while infantile death- 
rates increase? 

A. — Official figures are not obtain- 
able, but the following are said to be 
accurate : — 

Year. Births. Infant deaths. 

1913 1,839,000 277,000 

1914 1,820,000 207,000 

1915 1,416,000 216,000 

1916 1,103,000 167,000 

These figures would show that the in- 
fantile death rate has not increased, but 
has remained pretty constant at about 
15. 1 per cent of the new births. But the 
decrease in births is striking and it would 
indicate the war has heavily checked the 
nation's normal increase of population. 

Q- — What were the comparative 
rates in Germany before war? 

A. — The falling off of the birth rate 
had begun to cause concern. In Dres- 
den, for example, the figures were: 
1903, deaths, 8,570; births, 15,423. In 
1913 the proportion had changed to deaths, 
7,329; births, 11,297. In 191 5 there was a 
further change in proportion: deaths, 
6,406; births, 7,371. 

Thus, while the births were in excess 
of deaths each year, the ratio of births 
as against deaths showed a steady de- 
cline. 

It is obvious that the war will have 
changed this proportion still more and 
much for the worse. 

Q. — What is the population of 
Spain? 

A. — 20,330,000. The country is rather 
sparsely peopled — only 104 to the square 
mile. In Germany there are 324, in the 
United Kingdom 378. Holland, with 
6,200,000 inhabitants, has 493 to the 
square mile. Norway, with a population 
of 2,416,000, has a density of only 19, 
but Sweden's 5,960,000 dwell 32 to the 
square mile. Switzerland is a very small 
country, but manages to get 239 people 
to the square mile, and has a population 
of 3,830,000. Only 2,780,000 people live 
in Denmark. The land is poor, but in- 
tensely cultivated, there being 180 folk to 
the square mile. 



248 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What is the population of Rus- 
sia? 

A. — The Russian Empire has about 
170,000,000 inhabitants. Of these 27,000,- 
000 live in Asia. There are, of course, 
very many races in Russia, but the Slavs 
predominate. They mostly belong to the 
Greek Church. About 11,000,000 Moham- 
medans, 12,000,000 Roman Catholics, 
6,000,000 Jews, are the other notable re- 
ligious bodies. It is estimated that only 
50,000,000 Russians can read and write ; 
the rest are illiterate. 

Q. — Which country has the largest 
birth rate? 

A. — Russia (44 per thousand), but Rou- 
mania and Bulgaria run her close. Fol- 
lowing these come Hungary (36.3), 
Japan (33-9), Italy (32.4), Austria (31-3). 
German Empire (28.3), Commonwealth 
of Australia (28.3), Holland (28.1), Scot- 
land (25.9), England and Wales (23.8), 
Ireland (23.0), Belgium (22.9), France 
(19.0). 

Q. — Are the death rates in much 
the same proportion? 

A. — Not the same. Russia is highest 
(28.9), but France (17.5), is nowhere 
near the bottom of the table. Germany is 
15.6, England and Wales 13.3. 

Q. — What is the population of 
Scotland? 

A.— At the last census, in 191 1, it was 
4,760,904. Particulars of the number of 
volunteers from Scotland are not obtain- 
able, but it is known that when it came 
to conscription it was found that but few 
available men were left. The great ma- 
jority had already joined the colors. 

Q. — What is the exact population 
of Japan, and what that of 
China? 

A.— The number of persons in Japan 
and her dependencies, including Korea, is 
estimated ?t 73,440,000, which works out 
at 279 per square mile. The population 
of China and dependencies is estimated 
at 320,650,000, only 82 people to the 
square mile. The number of people in 
Japan proper, in 1910, was 50,750,000. 
Some 1,700,000 babies are born there every 
year. In Russia it is interesting to note 
that the number of births in 1912 was 
estimated at more than 7,000,000. 



Q. — Is the population of Japan in- 
creasing rapidly? 

A. — The annual increase is 600,000 
(births 1,700,000, deaths 1,110,000). That 
of the United Kingdom is about 400,000 ; 
that of France about 20,000. In Germany 
the surplus of births over deaths was 
about 900,000 every year. In Russia the 
annual increase was no less than 2,500,000. 
In Austria it was 300,000, and in Hun- 
gary 250,000, that is, 550,000 for the whole 
of the dual empire. The Bulgarians are 
a most prolific race, the balance of births 
over deaths being about 85,000 annually. 

Q. — What is the German-born pop- 
ulation of Australia? 

A. — According to Mr. Knibbs, 32,990. 
The same authority states that 590,722 
people who were born in the United King- 
dom are now in the Commonwealth — 
20,775 Chinese, 14,775 Scandinavians, 
6,644 British Indians, 6,719 Italians, 6,642 
Americans. 

Q. — Does life, morally, in Germany, 
compare unfavorably with 
other great Powers? 

A. — The figures are interesting. _ The 
following table gives the number of illegi- 
timate births per thousand births in dif- 
ferent countries for the quinquennial pe- 
riod, 1901-1905 : — 

Netherlands 23 

Ireland 26 

England and Wales 40 

South Australia 41 

West Australia 42 

Spain 44 

New Zealand 45 

♦Switzerland 45 

Italy 56 

♦Tasmania 57 

Scotland 64 

Queensland 65 

♦Finland 66 

Belgium 68 

New South Wales 70 

Victoria 7° 

♦Norway 74 

Germany 84 

France 88 

Hungary 94 

Denmark 101 

♦Sweden 113 

♦Portugal 121 

♦Austria I4 1 

Those marked (*) are for the period 
1896-1900. The United States has no 
national system of registered births, and 
the Russian figures are so incomplete 



Populations and Religions 



249 



as to be quite unreliable. If we divide 
the above figures by five, we get the yearly 
number of illegitimate babies per thou- 
sand births. 

Q. — Is it really true that there are 
an immense number of war ba- 
bies in Great Britain? 

A. — In 1015 there was a great agitation 
in England to reform the illegitimacy 
laws, to legalize the position of the girls 
who were "giving themselves to the 
country." Charity was asked for in order 
to support the children of the "absent- 
minded beggars at the front." The Gov- 
ernment was urged to adopt these chil- 
dren as the nation's wards. Cold sta- 
tistics prove that all this was much ado 
about nothing. The Registrar-General 
gives the number of illegitimate births 
in England and Wales, for the months of 
April, May and June, 1915, as 9,644. 
This, although a deplorably large num- 
ber, is 333 less than for the correspond- 
ing period of 1914. That is to say, the 
call to arms has reduced the evil, not in- 
creased it. It is the same in France. 

Q. — What was the population of 
Great Britain at the time of the 
Napoleonic wars? 

A. — In 1801 it was 10,942,000. The 
population of London at that time was 
864,800, that of Glasgow was 77,000. In 
1850, just before the Crimean war, the 
population of Great Britain was 20,936,- 
000, and of London 2,360,000. 

Q. — Has Germany been drained of 
her people by emigration to 
anything like the extent of the 
United Kingdom? 

A. — Men and women are not one of 
Germany's principal exports. The yearly 
departure for the last decade has only 
once touched 30,000, and averages about 
20,000. Practically all these went to the 
United States. The average emigration 
from Ireland for many years has been 
more than 30,000 per annum, and in the 
sixty years from 1851 to 1909 the island 
lost no less than 4,154,986 of its inhab- 
itants in this way. The total emigration 
from the United Kingdom has reached 
500,000 a year and has averaged more 
than 200,000 a year for the last decade. 
This means that, after making all allow- 
ances for immigration into the country, 
the United Kingdom has lost more than 
2,000,000 men, women and children during 
the last ten years by emigration. 



Q. — How many foreigners lived in 
Germany before the war? 

A. — In December, 1910 (the last figures 
that seem reliable or available), there 
were 1,259,873 subjects of foreign govern- 
ments in Germany. Of these 17,572 were 
from the United States and 6,253 from 
other American States, making a total of 
23,825 Americans. There were 667,159 
Austro-Hungarians, 137,697 Russians and 
Finns, 144,175 Dutch, 104,204 Italians, and 
68,257 Swiss, with the balance apportioned 
among Belgians, Danes, French, British 
and Scandinavians. 

Q. — How many foreigners usually 
visit Switzerland? 

A. — A few years before the war the 
figures showed 552,011 foreign visitors — 
pretty good for a country with only 
3,800,000 population of its own. 

Q. — What languages do the Swiss 
speak? 

A. — Besides their own dialect, the vari- 
ous cantons speak German, French, Ital- 
ian and Roumansch. 

Q. — Most British emigrants go to 
British colonies, do they not? 

A. — They do not, although during the 
last quinquennial period before the war 
something more than half went to Can- 
ada, Australia and other parts of the Em- 
pire. But 100,000 at least, often 200.000, 
have been steadily going to the United 
States every year for very many years. 

Q. — Is it true that a naturalized 
German in Australia ceases to 
be a British or Australian sub- 
ject once he is beyond the 
three-mile limit? 

A. — Any foreigner naturalized in Aus- 
tralia ceases to enjoy the privileges of 
British citizenship as soon as he leaves 
the country, as the British Government 
does not recognize its responsibility for 
anyone naturalized in the colonies. An 
attempt to alter this anomalous state of 
affairs was made in the British Nation- 
ality and Status of Aliens Act, which 
received the royal assent on August 7, 

1914, and came into force on January 1, 

1915. It is, however, specifically stated 
in the Act that it does not apply to, nor 
does any certificate of naturalization 
granted thereunder have any effect in the 
Commonwealth, Canada, New Zealand, 
South Africa and Newfoundland, unless 
the Act is there adopted. As this has 



250 



Questions and Answers 



not been done in Australia, any foreigner 
naturalized there is under the same dis- 
abilities as formerly — he ceases to enjoy 
the privileges of British citizenship as 
soon as he leaves the country. 

Q. — Have the Germans cancelled 
the naturalization papers of 
enemy subjects who are still 
residing in Germany? 

A. — There is no absolutely authentic in- 
formation on the subject, but apparently 
they have not cancelled them. As far as 
can be gathered from reports there are 
no foreigners who have acquired German 
nationality interned in Ruhleben, al- 
though a good number of the "Austra- 
lians" who are interned there are Ger- 
mans who became naturalized here. Their 
naturalization is therefore apparently 
recognized by the German authorities. 
The irony of the situation is that if 
these Australians were liberated and 
sent back to Australia, they would prob- 
ably be interned as Germans. 

Q. — What are the populations of 
the South American republics? 

Brazil 24,400,000 

Argentine 7,500,000 

Colombia 5,100,000 

Peru 4,500,000 

Chile 3,550,000 

Venezuela 2,760,000 

Bolivia 2,520,000 

Ecuador 1,500,000 

Uruguay 1 ,300,000 

Paraguay - 800,000 

Panama 400,000 

British Guiana 300,000 

Q. — Is this a war of religion? 

A. — This is not, in any sense, a relig- 
ious war, for Roman Catholics are fight- 
ing Roman Catholics, Protestants are 
furiously struggling with Protestants, 
Greek Catholics are opposed to Greek 
Catholics, and in a few cases even Mo- 
hammedans are slaying Mohammedans. 
The figures are interesting:— 

Roman Catholics 164,000,000 

Greek Church 113,000,000 

Protestants 95,000,000 

Mohammedans 24,000,000 

Q. — Are more Roman Catholics on 
the side of the Allies or of the 
Central Powers? 

A. — There are far more on the Allies' 
side. It is estimated that the number of 



Roman Catholics in Germany and Austria 
is 24,000,000 and 31,000,000 respectively. 
There are a few thousand Roman Cath- 
olics only in Bulgaria. France and Italy 
are Roman Catholic, and in the United 
Kingdom there are 6,000,000 professing 
this faith. The Poles are Roman Cath- 
olics ; so are the Portuguese. The Serbian 
religion is Greek Orthodox; so is the 
Russian. 

Q. — What is the number of adher- 
ents to the different religions 
of the world? 

A. — There are estimated to be in the 
world : — 

Roman Catholics 272,860,000 

Greek Catholics 120,000,000 

Protestants 171,650,000 

Jews 12,200,000 

Mohammedans 222,000,000 

Buddhists 138,000,000 

Hindus 210,500,000 

Confucianists & Taoists 300,000,000 

Shintoists 25,000,000 

Animists 158,000,000 

Miscellaneous 15,000,000 

That is, of a total of 1,646,000,000, 
roughly two-thirds are non-Christian and 
one-third Christian. 

Q. — What are Animists? 

A. — They are the races that have a 
primitive form of religion, which ex- 
presses itself in such practices as worship 
of the spirits of the dead, worship of ani- 
mals and plants, belief in a sky or under- 
world inhabited by corporeal beings, etc. 

Q. — Are there many Mohamme- 
dans in India? 

A. — At the census taken in 191 1 the 
total population of India was found to be 
3 T 5, 156,396, of whom 217,586,892 were 
Hindus, 66,647,299 were Mohammedans, 
10,721,453 were Buddhists, and 3,876,203 
were Christians. Of the total only 18,- 
539.578 persons could read and write. 
Two million persons were employed in 
taking this census, which cost only £135,- 
000 ($680,000). 

Q. — Is there religious freedom in 
Germany ? 

A. — In Germany there is entire liberty 
of conscience, and complete social equal- 
ity among all religious confessions. The 



Populations and Religions 



251 



Jesuit Order, however, was interdicted 
until lately in Germany. The Roman 
Catholics are in a majority in Alsace- 
Lorraine, Bavaria and Baden, and form 
more than 20 per cent of the population 
in Oldenburg, Wiirttemberg, Hessen and 
Prussia. 



Q. — Is there a religious revival 
abroad since the Great War 
began ? 

A. — There appears to be a great revival 
throughout the length and breadth of 
France. It is real, say those who have 
studied it ; the most real, tangible, pon- 
derable thing in the war. In view of 
such incidents as the bombardment of 
Paris on Palm Sunday by the German 
super-gun (when women and children at 
worship were killed by a shell which 
struck the Cathedral), it is striking to 



receive assurances that the German 
churches too are thronged. 

Q. — Was the Great Mosque of St. 
Sophia in Constantinople orig- 
inally a Christian Cathedral? 

A. — It was built by Justinian in 538, 
and replaced two earlier churches of the 
same name. The first one, built by Con- 
stantine, the founder of the city, was 
burnt in 404 ; the second, erected by Theo- 
dosius II, in 415, also was destroyed by 
fire. St. Sophia, until the Turks took it, 
was under the control of the Greek 
Church, which was not definitely sepa- 
rated from the Latin Church until the 
great schism of the ninth century. The 
beautiful paintings and mosaics of the 
saints inside the building were not all 
destroyed by the Turks, but wings were 
painted over their faces, as such figures 
were prohibited by the Mohammedan re- 
ligion. 



SHIP DESTRUCTION 



Q. — How much shipping has sub- 
marine warfare destroyed? 

A. — During the first 3^ years of the 
war, the most conflicting figures were 
given to the world. Official and unofficial 
statements in Europe were alternately en- 
couraging and alarming, but very few 
gave specific and authoritative facts. 
American experts, by close calculations, 
arrived at figures that lay between the 
British and German, and indicated se- 
riously alarming diminution of the world's 
tonnage. 



On March 21, 1918, the British Admir- 
alty suddenly made public its figures, kept 
secret until then, and they bore out the 
American opinion. The Admiralty fig- 
ures showed that the loss of world ton- 
nage from the beginning of war to the 
end of 1917 (thus including the first year, 
less a month, of unrestricted submarine 
warfare) amounted to 11,827,572 gross 
tons. It was stated that the figures in- 
cluded losses from the regular risks of 
the sea and also Allied tonnage interned 
in German ports. The latter amounted 
to 132,829 tons. Deducting it we had 
11,694,743 gross tons lost utterly to the 
world. 

Q. — What is the normal ship loss 
through storm and other risks ? 

A. — The average of total losses for 
twenty years shows a loss in peace time 
of about 156,000 tons a year, but as the 
world's tonnage has increased every year, 
of course this average loss must be fig- 
ured as increasing year by year. After 
war began the demand for tonnage caused 
many old ships to be put into service, and, 
as a good proportion of these probably 
was not highly seaworthy, the losses from 
storm, etc., must have increased quite 
beyond the normal average. Lacking pre- 
cise figures, only a guess can be made ; 
but if we guess that the loss from natural 
causes was a million tons from the be- 
ginning of war to March 1, 1918, we are 
probably making an exceedingly gener- 
ous estimate. This would make the total 
sunk by submarines 10,694,743 tons. 

Q. — What was the total ship loss 
before unrestricted warfare be- 
gan? 

.A — The British Admiralty figures of 
March 21, 1918, show the following: 



1914 — 498,534 tons; 19 1 5 1,724,720 tons; 
1916 — 2,797,866 tons, making a total of 
5,021,120 gross tons. As the submarine 
warfare through that period was only 
against Allied shipping, with only such 
neutral ships sunk as were carrying con- 
traband, the heaviest part of the loss was 
British and French. 

Q. — How much tonnage loss was 
British up to the beginning of 
unrestricted warfare? 

A. — The British losses (counting only 
the ships registered as belonging to the 
United Kingdom) were given by the 
Admiralty as follows : 1914 — 285,899 
tons; 1915 — 1,108,379 tons; 1916 — 1,497.- 
848 tons ; making a total to January 1, 
1918, of 2,892,126 gross tons. 

Q. — Did the first year of unre- 
stricted submarine warfare in- 
crease the British loss heavily ? 

A. — A little more than four million 
tons were sunk from January 1, 1917, to 
December 31, 1917 — that is, in the first 
year of unrestricted submarine warfare 
the British merchant marine lost one and 
one-third times as much tonnage as it 
had lost in all the previous years of the 
war. Unrestricted submarine warfare 
began on February 1, 1917. Therefore 
these figures, while taking in one month 
before it began, and leaving out one 
month (January, 1918), are close enough. 
The total British tonnage sunk in 1917 
was exactly 4,009,537, according to the 
Admiralty figures. 

Q. — How much shipping of all na- 
tions was destroyed in the first 
year of unrestricted warfare? 

A. — British, 4,009,537 tons ; other na- 
tions (including both Allies and neutrals), 
2,614,086 gross tons. Total of world's 
shipping destroyed in the first year of 
unrestricted submarine war (from Jan- 
uary 1, 1917, to December 31, I9 T 7)» 
6,623,623 tons. 

Q. — Did Great Britain's Allies lose 
heavily ? 

A. — According to the neutral figures, 
the losses of neutral tonnage in the first 
year of unrestricted warfare were 1,335,- 
000 tons. This would leave a destruc- 



252 



Ship Destruction 



253 



tion of 1,279,086 tons to be accounted 
for as being Allied merchant tonnage — 
French, Italian, Russian, Japanese, Por- 
tuguese, Greek, etc. The losses of Amer- 
ican tonnage were comparatively slight 
in proportion, and made only a very 
small part of this total. 

Q. — How many American vessels 
were sunk ? 

A. — It was announced in January, 1918, 
that during the twelvemonth up to Jan- 
uary 25, 1918, submarines, raiders and 
mines had sunk 69 American vessels total- 
ing 176,061 tons. A good number of 
these were sailing ships. The loss of life 
was more than 300. 

Among the ships sunk were German 
vessels that had sheltered in American 
ports while this country was neutral, and 
which were requisitioned later and put 
into American service. The Actaeon, 
formerly the Adamsthurm and the 
Owasco, formerly the Allemania, were 
thus sunk. 

Q. — What shipping did the neu- 
trals lose? 

A. — The figures given by the neutral 
nations were : Norway, 680,000 tons ; 
Sweden, 200,000 tons ; Holland, 175,000 
tons ; Spain, 80,00a tons ; other neutrals, 
200,000 tons, or a total of 1,335,000 tons. 

Q. — What figures did the Germans 
claim for submarine sinkings? 

A. — The Germans, according to state- 
ments made by some officials, expected to 
sink one million tons a month or twelve 
millions in the year of unrestricted war- 
fare. In November, 1917, the German 
Admiralty gave out figures that asserted 
a total destruction in the first nine 
months of 7,518,000 tons, or almost a 
million tons more than the British fig- 
ures give for a whole year. Calculating 
the remaining three months' sinkings on 
the basis of the lowest month's German 
calculations, the German figures would 
claim a total sinking in the first year of 
unrestricted warfare of nine and one-half 
million tons. 

Q. — What did Germany claim as 
the total destruction of mer- 
chant tonnage since war be- 
gan? 

A. — An unofficial statement at the end 
of 1917 asserted that up to that time 



18,000,000 tons had been destroyed. This 
was to the end of November, 1917, and 
without counting in December. These 
figures claimed as the total sinkings be- 
fore unrestricted submarine warfare a 
tonnage of 4,560,000 gross. This was less 
than the British Admiralty statement of 
1918, which admits a loss of a little more 
than five million gross tons. 

Q. — Had ship construction kept 
pace with destruction? 

A. — It had not. The American Govern- 
ment from the first maintained a con- 
sistent attitude, warning the nation that 
the submarine peril was very real and 
very acute. The correctness of this 
American position was proved on March 
20, 1918, when it was stated in the British 
Parliament that submarine destruction 
amounted to more than six million tons 
during the first year of unrestricted war- 
fare. The figures- that were then given 
as to construction to meet the loss, were 
much less optimistic than those that had 
been issuing. However, it still was 
claimed that the world had forty-two mil- 
lion tons of shipping left and that seventy- 
five per cent of the losses was being re- 
placed by new construction. 

Q. — What did American figures 
suggest as to the tonnage 
shortage? 

A. — On March 1, 1918, two weeks before 
the^British Admiralty figures were pub- 
lished, the executive board of the Na- 
tional Patriotic Societies made public fig- 
ures asserting that the shortage in world 
tonnage was almost seven and one-half 
million tons — that is, equal to a shortage 
of 1,500 five-thousand-ton vessels. It 
was declared that the total tonnage really 
available to the United States and the 
Allies was four and one-half million tons 
less than it had been in 1914. Attention 
also was called to the fact that this short- 
age was aggravated by the demand for 
at least three million tons to transport 
and maintain one and one-half million 
men in the war zone. Sir Eric Geddes 
said on March 20, 1918, before Parliament 
that the world shortage was only two and 
one-half million tons. 

Q. — What is the new ship con- 
struction of the world? 

A. — When the British Admiralty made 
its secret figures of submarine sinkings 
public on March 21, 1918, it gave also an 
estimate of the amount of new construe- 



254 



Questions and Answers 



tion by all the nations of the world ex- 
clusive of the Central Powers. The fig- 
ures showed that at the end of 1915 there 
had been built a little more than two 
million new tonnage. In 1916 there was 
built a total tonnage of 1,600,000. The 
tonnage building in 1917 was a little more 
than 2,700,000 tons. Altogether, in exact 
figures, the new tonnage (part of which 
was only laid down in 1917 and not ready 
to launch) was 6,606,275 tons. That 
meant that the submarines were sinking 
merchant tonnage almost twice as fast as 
new tonnage was being produced (one and 
three-quarter times as fast, to be exact). 
In 1918, however, there came a complete 
change. Ship destruction was cut down 
enormously, mostly through adoption of 
the convoy system, and ship construction 
increased heavily in Great Britain and 
became truly great in the United States. 

Q. — Did not Norway lose more 
tonnage than some of the bel- 
ligerents ? 

A. — Norway's loss of 680,000 tons 
caused her a bigger loss in tonnage than 
that of France, Italy, Russia, Greece or 
Japan. As, however, Norway was a great 
merchant-marine nation, her losses com- 
paratively were not so heavy as those of 
such belligerents as originally had only 
a limited merchant marine. 



Q. — What is Norway's rank in 
ownership of merchant ton- 
nage? 

A. — Norway has a population of only 
2,390,000. Her mercantile tonnage as re- 
corded last was 2,770,000 — more than one 
ton per head of population. Germany, 
with a population of 68 millions, had 
4,150,000 tonnage. Great Britain, with 
46H million population, had 19,130,000 
tonnage before the war. 

Q. — Are the Germans building 
many merchant ships? 

A. — Neutral visitors reported that many 
merchant ships had been laid down since 
the war began, and the reports of Ger- 
man shipping companies show that there 
must have been many new ships on the 
stocks. The North German Lloyd re- 
ported that since 1914 it had taken over 
ten vessels in course of construction, with 
an aggregate tonnage of 70,000 tons, and 
that there still were eight steamers being 
built, of an aggregate tonnage of 135,000 



tons. These include the Columbus and 
the Hindenburg , each of 35,000 tons, much 
larger than the giant Vaterland. Of the 
company's 25,000 employees, some 6,000 
were then serving at the front or in the 
navy. 

Q. — What was the effect of war on 
America so far as ship-move- 
ment was concerned? 

A. — The records of the Department of 
Commerce show that for the period be- 
ginning February 1, 1917, and ending De- 
cember 1, 1917, the clearances from Amer- 
ican ports were 17,738,000 tons net (about 
28,834,000 gross). This total, of course, 
was produced by many repeated voyages 
of the same ships. 

Q. — In what months of the year 
can submarines act most ener- 
getically? 

A. — The figures of tonnage lost by the 
month will give an indication. A more 
graphic one is offered by the following 
table showing numbers of ships lost in 
each month from February 1, 1917, to 
February 1, 1918. 

British Losses in Ships. 

Number 
Ships. 

February 140 

March 93 

April 185 

May 113 

June no 

July 81 

August 104 

September 73 

October 87 

November ♦ 61 

December 70 

January (not wholly complete) 52 

Total 1,169 

Q._Why was the ship "Frye" 
sunk? 

A. — The William P. Frye was an 
American ship that was captured by the 
German raider Prins Eitel Friedrich, Jan- 
uary 28, 1915, while carrying a cargo of 
wheat to the British Isles. The raider 
took off her crew and sank the ship on 
the ground that the cargo was contra- 
band. The United States Government 
protested against the sinking, urging that 
it was in violation of the treaties of 
1799 and 1828 with Prussia, and pre- 
sented a claim for the value of the ship. 
The German Government acknowledged 



Ship Destruction 



255 



its liability under the treaties, but con- 
tended that the sinking of the ship was 
legal if its value in money was paid. An 
agreement was finally reached, providing 
that the question whether there had been 
a violence of international law should be 
referred for decision to The Hague tri- 
bunal. 

Q. — Has the submarine campaign 
failed? 

A. — It has failed completely in its 
avowed purpose of starving out Great 
Britain and of preventing the transport 
of troops and munitions and food from 
the United States. 

On September 21, 1918, it was officially 
announced at Washington that between 
August, 1914, and September, 1918, the 
total tonnage of new ships constructed 
and enemy ships seized left a deficit in 
world tonnage, as compared with August, 
1914. of 3,362,088 tons, and that the future 
must see even this deficit rapidly made up. 



The sinkings in June, 1918, were only a 
little more than half the average for this 
period, and new construction passed the 
losses in the previous month. The United 
States alone delivered in August 324,189 
tons of ships over 2,500 tons ; and its 
1,020 shipways (more than double those 
in all the rest of the world) had 386,000 
employees working on a total programme 
of over 16,000,000 tons. 

And the most impressive answer to the 
main question is that: 

(1) The food situation in Great Bri- 
tain was better, not worse. 

(2) The United States in its first year 
of war sent 1,500,000 men, with supplies 
and equipment to France, with no losses. 

Q. — How has Germany deserved 
execration in the manner of 
her sinkings? 

A. — The U-boat commanders have re- 
peatedly sunk merchant and passenger 
ships without warning; they have given 
men, women and children a few minutes 
to take to boats in rough seas and cold 
weather far from land ; they have torpe- 
doed hospital ships again and again; they 
have actually fired on the loaded small 
boats and survivors struggling in the wa- 
ter; in at least one case the crew of a 
sunken vessel was placed on the deck of 
the submarine and the U-boat then sub- 
merged. 

_ These ruthless violations of interna- 
tional law and of ordinary humanity have 
continued for four years, clearly under 
the orders of the authorities. 



And the most conspicuous of all, the 
sinking of the Lusitania was commemo- 
rated in Germany by the striking off a 
medal and celebrated by the German peo- 
ple as a great naval victory. 

More than any other one act it has 
been the barbarities of submarine warfare 
which have aligned the whole world 
against Germany and her allies. 

Q. — What has the civilized world 
been led to conclude as to Ger- 
man character? 

A. — Even those who most admired the 
former greatness of German music, lit- 
erature, scholarship and organization have 
become filled with horror at what seems 
to be an essential strain of inhuman 
cruelty in their make-up. Their own great 
men have noted this : "Goethe and Heine 
long ago insisted on the savage element 
in the Prussian." 

Here is what a German himself has re- 
cently said — Wilhelm Miihlon, formerly a 
director in Krupp's, intimate with the 
Kaiser, military leaders, business men, and 
an earnest student of his nation: 

"The Germans . . . are like barbarians, 
who become intoxicated with victory, even 
if it has been achieved at the expense 
of defenseless opponents. With wild hur- 
rahs they are already distributing in their 
tents the treasures and the men taken as 
booty. But if a strong courageous enemy, 
of whose approach in their hour of vic- 
tory they had had no warning, should 
surprise them, they would again take 
hasty flight to their swamps and forests 
and would be as content with these as 
they were formerly eager to roam all 
over the earth, mere vagrants without any 
understanding world relationships." 

Again : 

"Generally speaking, one may say of the 
German soldier that he is normally good- 
natured and is not disposed to do injury 
to harmless people, so long as he finds 
no obstacle put in his prescribed way^ 
But once disturbed, he becomes frightful, 
because he lacks any higher power of dis- 
crimination ; because he merely does his 
military duty and recognizes no such thing 
as individual conscience ; when excited be- 
comes at once blind and supernervous." 

And finally: 

"If I should ever hear a voice in Ger- 
many which speaks of justice, humanity, 
or non-material progress after the war, or 
after our victory, then I will comment on 
the fact with pride and very fully, even 
if it is the voice of an unknown and un- 
important person. I shall call him the 
first European in Germany." 



AMERICAN SHIP SEIZURES 



Q. — How many German and Aus- 
trian ships did we requisition? 

A. — Requisitions in American ports 
after American declaration of war added 
107 vesssls with a tonnage of 686,494 gross 
tons to the merchant marine under the 
United States flag. 

This leaves out of account such German 
and Austrian ships as were taken over for 
naval and army purposes. 

Q. — What was the value of these 
ships? 

A. — It was estimated to be more than 
$100,000,000. This great aggregate value 
was produced, of course, by the many 
magnificent liners among the requisitioned 
ships, and the greatly increased ship- 
values. 

Q.— Did the United States add 
other ships to the merchant 
service by requisition? 

A. — Through the Shipping Act the 
United States requisitioned in American 
shipyards 426 vessels totalling more than 
2,000,000 gross tons, which were building 
for neutrals and for Great Britain, France 
and other of the Allied nations. 

Q. — What was the capacity of the 
German liners? 

A. — Fifteen of the ships were ocean 
liners ranging from 10,000 to 54,000 tons. 
These fifteen ships had an aggregate ton- 
nage of 280,000 tons, and a combined car- 
rying capacity of 60,000 troops. 

Q. — When did requisitioned Ger- 
man ships carry supplies to 
the front? 

A.— On January 29, 1918, announcement 
was made that sixteen former _ German 
ships had reached France within a pe- 
riod preceding the announcement. Among 
these was the great Vaterland, re-named 
Leviathan. Among the others were: Cov- 
ington, {Cincinnati), America, (Amer- 
ika), President Grant, President Lin- 
coln, Powhatan, (Hamburg) , Madawaska, 
(Koenig Wilhelm II), George Washing- 
ton, Mount Vernon (Kronprinzcssin Ce- 



cilie), Agamemnon (Kaiser Wilhelm II), 
Aeolus (Grosser Kurfiirst), Mercury 
(Barbarossa) , Pocahontas (Princess 
Irene), Huron (Friedrich der Grosse), 
Von Steuben (Kronprinz Wilhelm), De 
Kalb (Prinz Eitel Friedrich). 

The names in parentheses are the origi- 
nal German names of these ships. 

Q. — What other German ships 
were re-named? 



German name. 

Andromeda 

Breslau 

Frieda Leonhart. . . . 

Geier 

Grunewald . . . U.S.S. 

Hermes 

Hohenfelde 

Kiel 

Liebenfcls 

Locksun 

Ncckar 

Nicaria 

Oldenwald U. 

Praesident 

Rhein ■•'... 

Rudolph Blumberg.. 

Saxonia 

Staatssckraetar Solf 
Vogensen 



American name. 

U.SS. Bath 

. . . U.SS. Bridgeport 

U.SS. Astoria 

USS. Schurz 

Gen. G. W. Goethals 

USS. Hermes 

. U.SS. Long Beach 

U.SS. Camden 

U.SS. Houston 

USS Gulf port 

U.SS. Antigone 

USS. Pensacola 

S. S. Newport News 

USS. Kittery 

. U.SS. Susquehanna 

U.SS. Beaufort 

. . . . U.SS. Savannah 

U.SS. Samoa 

, U.SS. Quincy 



Q. — Was it possible to repair all 
the German ships? 

A. — It was announced officially that by 
1918 every damaged German ship had 
been fully repaired and was in active use, 
some having made three or four round 
trips through the war zone. 

Q. — Why did the American Gov- 
ernment not prevent damage 
of these ships? 

A. — Before the American declaration of 
war, the German and Austrian ships were 
sheltering in American ports under full 
right, and their masters and crews were 
in complete charge. The American Gov- 
ernment had only such rights oyer them 
as every government may exercise over 
foreign ships in its waters. This right 
did not extend to interference with any 
acts of master or crew that did not en- 
danger the security or peace of the 
United States. 



256 



American Ship Seizures 



257 



Q. — Were the ships badly dam- 
aged? 

A. — Some of the damage was very 
great, indeed — so great as to lead to the 
fear that repairs would be found im- 
mensely difficult. But American engi- 
neers and metallurgists attacked the prob- 
lems on a big scale, and devised hun- 
dreds of ingenious methods which ac- 
complished results in a truly marvelous 
way. Very wonderful feats were accom- 
plished particularly by application of 
highly modern welding processes, and 
some of the achievements will take their 
place in the annals of mechanics. The 
quickness with which the ships were put 
into service was one of the first proofs 
that American war efficiency was very 
real. 

Q. — What German ships were in- 
terned in New York? 

Tons. 

Adamsturm 5,000 

Allemannia 4,630 

Armenia 5,464- 

Barbarossa 10,984 

Bohemia 8,414 

Clara Menig ' 1,685 

Friedrich der Gross e 10,771 

George Washington 25,570 

Grosser Kurfurst 13,102 

Harburg 4,472 

Hamburg J o,53i 

*Indea 1,746 

Kaiser WUhelm II 19,361 

Koenig WUhelm II 9,410 

Magdeburg 4,497 

Maia 2,555 

*Matador 1,468 

Pennsylvania 13,333 

Pisa 4,967 

Portonia 2,778 

President Grant 18,072 

President Lincoln 18,168 

Princess Irene 10,893 

Prins Eitel Friedrich 4,650 

Prim Joachim 4,760 

Vaterland 54,282 



271,503 

Q. — Were many ships interned in 
other ports? 

BOSTON 

Kronprinsessin Cecile 19,503 

Cincinnati 16,339 

Amerika 22,622 

Wittekurd 5,640 

Willehad 4,761 

Kohn 7,409 

Ockenfels 5,621 

81,895 



NEW ORLEANS 

Breslau 7,624 

Andromeda 2,554 

SAN FRANCISCO 

Serapis 4,756 

BALTIMORE 

Bulgaria 1 1,440 

Neckar 9,835 

Rhein 10,058 

CHARLESTON, S. C. 

Liebenfels 4,525 

PORTLAND, OREGON 

*Dalbek 2,723 

Kurt 1,73 1 

Arnoldus Vinnen 1,860 

SAVANNAH 

Hohenfelde 2,974 

WILMINGTON, N. C. 

Nicaria 3,974 

Kiel 4,494 

PHILADELPHIA 

Rhaetia 6,600 

Franconia 4,637 

Prins Oskar 6^026 

SEATTLE 

Saxonia 4,424 

*Steinbek 2,164 

HONOLULU 

Prins Waldemar 3,227 

Pommem 6,557 

Gouverneur Jaeschke 1,738 

Holsatia 5,644 

Loong Moon 1,971 

Staatssekretar Kraetke 2,009 

Letos 4,730 

O. J. D. Alhers 7,490 

Hermes 1,180 

SAN JUAN, P.R. 

Odcnwald 3,537 

Praesident 1,849 

TAMPA 

Rudolf Blumberg 1,769 

Frieda Leonhardt 2,789 

Vogensen 3,716 

NORFOLK 

Appam 7,781 

Prins Eitel Friedrich 8,797 

Kronprins WUhelm 14,908 

* Sailing ships. 

Q. — Must belligerents pay for use 
of enemy ships used during 
war? 

A. — According to international law, 

payment must be made for the use of all 



258 



Questions and Answers 



enemy ships which were in harbor when 
war was declared or were taken on the 
high seas before the captain knew that 
war had broken out. It is even customary 
to obtain the formal permission of the 
enemy company owning the ships before 
making use of them. Such permission 
is, of course, granted, because the ships 
would be commandeered whether or no. 
The terms of hire are, as a rule, settled 
by the courts. In the last report of the 
Nord Deutscher Lloyd Company mention 
is made of there having been five of its 
ships in Italian harbors, four in Portu- 
guese, and five in Australian, "which have 
all been requisitioned, and will be duly 
paid for." It stated further that two large 
and three small ships had been lost in 
government service, and five had been 
captured on the high seas. 

Q. — If the Germans sink requisi- 
tioned German ships, who will 
pay for them in the end? 

A. — If this matter were not complicated 
bv public feeling, quarrels over mutual 
charges of violations of international law, 
etc., the answer would be very simple. 
We should have to pay for them. The 
legal argument is as follows: (i) the Ger- 
man ships sheltered in American ports 
when the United States was neutral. In 
so doing they exercised their good right 
and it was the duty of the neutral to so 
shelter them. (2) When the United 
States declared war on Germany, the Ger- 
man merchant shipping in her ports thus 
occupied the position of being vessels en- 
titled to immunity from prize capture, 
under the international law that a bellig- 
erent may not make prize of enemy mer- 
chant vessels that lie in his ports at the 
time of declaring war. (3) The only right 
that the United States thus had as against 
these vessels was to requisition them. 
This right was exercised. Requisition 
does not carry ownership with it. Requi- 
sition carries with it, on the contrary, re- 
sponsibility both for safety and for the 
use of the requisitioned property. Under 
international law, the owners of the Ger- 
man ships therefore have the right to col- 
lect from the United States after the 
termination of the war. It should be 
added that there might be found a for- 
midable list of contra charges. 

Q. — But is it fair to pay for ships 
that the enemy sinks? 

A. — It would hardly be possible for 
public opinion in the United States to see 
anything but crying injustice in any claim 



by Germany for payment. No doubt this 
public opinion will play a great part in 
the final adjustment of the question. 

Q. — Are there no legal points to 
justify non-payment for ships 
thus sunk? 

A. — There are many; but before we 
enumerate them we must explain that the 
legal points that justly tell against the 
German Government do not necessarily 
tell against the private German owners of 
the ships ; and it is the private German 
owner who has the claim under interna- 
tional law. However, even this matter 
may develop an interesting point, viz., that 
possibly the German Government is part 
owner in at least some of these vessels, 
by virtue either of stock ownership or of 
laws designed to encourage German ship- 
ping. 

As against the German Government, the 
United States could maintain that what- 
ever ships were sunk were so sunk ille- 
gally. To this the German Government 
would respond, no doubt, that (1) the 
German war zone orders were justified as 
reprisal against Allied violations of laws 
of blockade; (2) that armed merchant 
vessels, and merchant vessels armed or 
unarmed, under convoy were subject to 
attack without previous visit and search. 

Q. — Why did we not seize the Ger- 
man ships in the Danish Is- 
lands? 

A. — It had been generally assumed that 
these vessels, like other enemy craft shel- 
tering in American harbors, could be 
commandeered when the United States 
declared war against Germany. It has 
been found, however, that in the deed of 
sale it was specifically stipulated that the 
German vessels in the harbors of the 
Danish West Indies should not be com- 
mandeered in the event of the United 
States going to war with Germany. They 
remain, therefore, in the Harbors of what 
are now known as the Virgin Islands, and 
cannot be touched. 

Q. — What happened to German 
ships in the Suez Canal? 

A. — There were seven, and as they 
could not get away they remained in the 
Canal. Ultimately, the British Govern- 
ment insisted that the directors of the 
company should instruct them to leave 
as they were obviously not utilizing the 
canal for its proper purpose, but were 
sheltering themselves there in the sanctu- 
tuary created by the internationalization 






American Ship Seizures 



259 



of this waterway. As they were not 
granted right of passage to home ports, 
and yet had to le'ave the canal, they have, 
presumably, passed into British hands. 

Q. — What British ships were seized 
in German ports? 

A. — Seventy-four, with a total tonnage 
of 170,000. 

Q. — What German ships were 
seized in British ports? 

A. — One hundred and two, with a ton- 
nage of 200,000. In addition, 88 were cap- 
tured, aggregating 338,000 tons, and 168 
of 283,000 tons, were detained in the ports 
of France, Belgium and Russia, chiefly 
at Antwerp. 

Q. — Did the Allies seize German 
ships in Greek harbors? 

A. — It was announced that when the 
Allies occupied the wireless station, tele- 
graph offices, the post-offices, and the Cus- 
toms at the Piraeus in 1917, a launch from 
a French cruiser visited the four German 
East African steamers which had lain 
in the harbor since the outbreak of war, 
hoisted the French flag on each ship, and 
left a detachment of French soldiers on 
board, after arresting the few Germans 
found on the vessels. At the same time, 
the Hamburg-American liner, Marienbad, 
was seized in the Gulf of Salamis, and 
another ship was taken over in the har- 
bor of Lyra. 

Q.— Who purchased the "Dacia"? 

A. — This is the ship about which there 
was so much controversy during 1915. 
She was a German vessel, and was pur- 
chased by an American of German 
descent named E. M. Breitung. He paid 
$165,000 for the ship, loaded her with 
$750,000 worth of cotton, which was to 
be carried to a German port for $190,000 
freight money. At that time cotton was 
not contraband of war, and it was gener- 
ally understood that Great Britain recog- 
nized as legal the transfer of an enemy 
ship to a neutral citizen. The matter was 
solved, however, by the Dacia being cap- 
tured by a French cruiser, as France does 
not recognize the transfer of an enemy 
ship to a neutral during war time. 

Q. — If a British ship is sunk, will 
the British Government make 
good the loss? 

A. — It is hardly probable. In any case 
the loss would not fall on the shipping 



company, but on the underwriters, and 
as the government has offered insurance 
on lower terms than Lloyds, much of the 
loss has actually been borne by the gov- 
ernment already. The Admiralty does 
not guarantee protection to merchant- 
men. They put to sea at their own risk. 

Q. — How many German ships were 
in Portuguese and Italian 
ports? 

A. — There were 36 at Lisbon and 8 at 
St. Vincent, Cape Verde Islands, and 2 
at Goa. There were 37 German vessels 
in Italian ports. 

Q. — Have any German ships es- 
caped from neutral ports? 

A. — About the middle of February, 1917, 
the Bahrenfcld got away from Buenos 
Ayres, and the Turpin from Punta Are- 
nas, Chili. The Asuncion endeavored to 
escape from Para, but was prevented by 
Brazilian cruisers. Rumors of other ves- 
sels stealing away have been many, but 
probably most of them are incorrect. 

Q. — How many German ships did 
the Allies capture in the Cam- 
eroons? 

A. — There appear to have been sixteen 
steamers lying in Duala harbor when the 
place was occupied. Eleven of these were 
Woermann Line steamers. As these are 
properly prizes of war, some of them 
have since been sold. The Elder-Demp- 
ster Company, which has lost nine steam- 
ers at the hands of the enemy, including 
the Appam and the Falaba, purchased one 
of the Woermann liners at a prize sale, 
and renamed it the Gold Coast. 

Q.— -What was the "Appam" case? 

A. — The British merchant ship Appam 
was captured by the German raiding crui- 
ser Moewe (Gull) on January 15, 1916. 
A German prize crew was put aboard, 
and while the Moewe continued her cruise, 
the Appam was brought safely westward 
and succeeded in passing the British cor- 
don off Chesapeake Bay and anchoring 
safely in Hampton Roads. 

Q. — Did the Germans have the 
right to bring a prize into 
American ports? 

A. — They did. But the question arose 
whether they had the right to keep her 
there, and thus use American ports as an 
asylum for prize ships. The Germans 



260 



Questions and Answers 



claimed that provisions in the United 
States-Prussian treaties of 1799 and 1828 
conferred this special right. The United 
States claimed that the clauses cited did 
not permit the entry of a prize unattended 
by the capturing vessel. This view was 
upheld by the Supreme Court in a decision 
handed down March 6, 1917. The result 
was that the Appam finally was turned 
back to her British owners. 



Q. — Have the Germans respected 
international law on sea or 
land? 

A. — No. Every violation, the invasion 
of Belgium, the sinking of the Lusitania, 
the deliberate policy of "frightfulness," 
the bombing of hospitals, the use of am- 
bassadors for treacherous acts against 
neutrals, and scores of others — has been 
declared due to "military necessity." They 
have made it clear in a thousand ways 
that any law, human or divine, which 
stood in the way of their achieving victory 
must go by the board. 












THE WORLD'S SHIPS OF PEACE 



Q. — How did our Atlantic mer- 
chant fleet begin to grow? 

A. — In July, 1917, some ships in the 
Pacific were transferred to the Atlantic. 
In August, 1917, the Shipping Board asked 
Congress for another appropriation of 
$915,000,000 for its building program. 
This amount would be used for purchase 
and commandeering of materials and 
plants and for ship construction. Legis- 
lation was asked to permit ships of for- 
eign register to engage in coastwise trade. 

On August 24, 1917, nearly 3,000,000 
tons of shipping was ready to be con- 
tracted for, and 1,281,000 more under ne- 
gotiation at a total estimated cost includ- 
ing cost of commandeering and the pur- 
chase of available vessels of $915,000,000; 
of this fully two-thirds are for the At- 
lantic fleet. June 15, 1917, all power- 
driven cargo-carrying and passenger ves- 
sels above 2,500 tons deadweight capacity 
under construction in any yard, and ma- 
terials, equipment and outfit thereto, were 
requisitioned by the United States. 

Q. — How much shipping did this 
give us? 

A. — On September 26, 1917, the United 
States had 458 ships of over 1,500 dead- 
weight tons with an aggregate tonnage of 
2,871,359. There were also 117 ships of 
German and Austrian origin, totaling 
700,285 tons. Four hundred ships of 2;- 
500,000 tons had been commandeered and 
636 ships with 3,124,700 tons were con- 
tracted for by the U. S. Emergency Fleet 
Corporation. It was at this date expected 
that the United States would have near 
the end of 1918 a merchant fleet of more 
than 1,600 ships, aggregating 9,200,000 
tons, as compared with an overseas ma- 
rine of 1,614,222 tons on June 30, 1914. 

Q. — How did we get Great Lakes 
ships to the Atlantic? 

A. — By the astonishing process of cut- 
ting the ships in half and towing the 
pieces through to the St. Lawrence 
river, and then patching the ships to- 
gether again. In the last part of 1917, 
the United States Government comman- 
deered about 20 ships from the coast- 
wise trade and then went to work to re- 
place them with steamers from the Great 
Lakes fleet. The latter were from 275 to 



300 feet long, whereas the locks of the 
canals would not accommodate vessels of 
more than 250 feet. The big iron ships 
were cut in two and the halves were 
brought through the locks separately, to 
be spliced together again in the St. Law- 
rence River Most of the ships were 
brought together again and made whole 
in the water without dry-docking. Divers^ 
bolted the halves together and the sides 
were securely united by heavy steel tie- 
plates. 

Q. — How much money has been in- 
vested in American shipping? 

A. — Since the war began a total of 
$401,749,000 has been invested in ship 
firms in this country. For January, 1918, 
alone the amount was $21,274,000. There 
were nineteen new ship firms incorporated 
in January. Of the $21,274,000 invested, 
$6,650,000 was designated for shipbuild- 
ing and $14,624,000 for other shipping 
projects. The development over the en- 
tire war-period is shown in the follow- 
ing table compiled for The Journal of 
Commerce, which sets forth the author- 
ized capital of new concerns: 

Five months, 1914 $1,844,000 

Year 1915 37,662,000 

Year 1916 69,466,000 

Year 1917 271,503,000 

Q. — How many shipyards have 
we? 

A. — Six years ago the United States 
had barely seven shipyards. To-day these 
seven yards and 132 others are working 
night and day, two and three shifts at a 
time, turning out vessels for the Emer- 
gency Shipping Board. The shipyards are 
scattered throughout the United States 
from Fore River, Boston and Newark 
Bay, Delaware, New York, Philadelphia, 
Newport News, clear around Mobile on 
the south, to Seattle and Tacoma on the 
west. 

Q. — What is meant by a "stand- 
ardized" ship? 

A. — It is a ship the parts of which can 
be manufactured in multiples of tens and 
hundreds of thousands, then assembled in 
a shipbuilding plant. In Great Britain, 
standardizing of ships has been in vogue 



261 



262 



Questions and Answers 



for a quarter of a century, decreasing the 
cost of ships 50 per cent. Under this 
plan, one shipyard may limit itself to only 
one size and type of ship. The parts, all 
alike, can be manufactured in many dif- 
ferent factories in any desired quantity — 
plates in one, boilers in another, engines 
in another, rivets in another. The ship- 
yard thus would be the assembling plant 
merely. The benefits gained from stand- 
ardizing are decreased cost and increased 
speed. 

Q. — What were the chief difficul- 
ties in the way of the immense 
program? 

A. — It might be accurate to say that a 
number of difficulties were so great as 
well to make them all "chief" in rank. 
The supply of man-labor was a vast prob- 
lem. The production of enough material 
was another. The transportation of this 
material was still another. Each of these 
great problems was independent of the 
rest, yet not one of the problems could 
be solved satisfactorily without solving 
the others simultaneously. Other difficul- 
ties, minor in comparison, but actually 
enormous in specific aspect were: ("0 
erecting shipyards, (2) providing housing 
and food supply for labor, (3) financing 
the vast expenditures, (4) fuel, (5) ad- 
justing all these imperative needs to the 
equally imperative needs of other indus- 
tries, and to the absolutely imperative 
needs of the army and navy. 

Q. — What was the "Great Shipyard 
Drive"? 

A. — On January 28, 1918, the United 
States government employment service 
began a nation-wide campaign to enlist 
workers for the shipyards. State direc- 
tors of the Public Service Reserve con- 
ducted the drive in the various states. 

Q. — Have we a training ship for 
the merchant marine? 

A. — Yes. The first training ship of the 
United States Merchant Marine, the Cal- 
vin Austin, brought its first graduates to 
New York in March, 1918, and the men 
were placed in their first positions. The 
Calvin Austin is stationed regularly at 
Boston, where the Recruiting Service of 
the Shipping Board has its headquarters. 

Q. — Is it true that ships can be 
built of concrete? 

A. — Yes. The Shipping Board gave 
contracts in February, 1918, for ten such 



craft to be constructed by the Ferro Con- 
crete Shipbuilding Corporation of Re- 
dondo Beach, Cal. The vessels were to 
be of 3,500 tons. In March, 1918, the first 
large concrete ship was launched on the 
Pacific coast. The craft was 5,000 tons 
and named Faith. 

Q. — When was the concrete ship 
invented ? 

A. — The first craft made of reinforced 
concrete was a small one, built by a 
Frenchman in 1849. Before 1900 some 
barges of about 100 tons were in use in 
Italy and Holland. In 1900 a large 200- 
ton barge for river traffic was built in 
Germany, and by 1918 concrete barges 
varying in capacity up to 700 tons were 
being used in the Panama Canal, the Wel- 
land Ship Canal, the Manchester Ship 
Canal in England, and in the harbors of 
San Francisco, Baltimore, and Sydney, 
New South Wales. 

Q. — Who built the first big con- 
crete vessel? 

A. — Norway. A 400-ton ship was 
launched in 1917, and it has been an- 
nounced that regular ocean-going cargo 
vessels are to follow. They are to be as 
big as 5,000 tons, though those now being 
designed or constructed appear to be 
from 3,000 to 4,000 tons. Instead of using 
steam, they will be propelled by gigantic 
Diesel oil-motors. 

Q. — What was the result of nego- 
tiations with the Swedish Gov- 
ernment over shipping? 

A. — Late in January, 1918, preliminary 
agreement was made with Sweden 
through conferences in London, provid- 
ing for the charter of Swedish ships to 
the United States, to be used principally 
for South American trade. It was an- 
nounced that some of the Swedish vessels 
which had been held in American waters 
would be allowed to sail with their 
cargoes. 

Q. — How many ships of 10,000 
tons are there in the world? 

A. — A good number have been sunk 
during the war, and a few may have been 
launched. In 1914 there were 130 British 
ships of this size afloat, and some 15 
launched or building. There were 40 
German afloat, and half a dozen building 
or just launched. The United States had 



The World's Ships of Peace 



263 



9, France 15, Holland 7, Japan 4, and 
Belgium 5. Altogether, afloat, launched 
and building, there were about 250. 

Q. — What is the increased capacity 
of British ships owing to sanc- 
tioning of deck loads ? 

A. — Some shipping experts assert that 
by deck loading, and the permission given 
to load ships down to the "Indian Sum- 
mer" Plimsoll mark, no less than 500,000 
tons was in effect added to the British 
mercantile marine. 

Q. — What is the Plimsoll mark? 

A. — It is a government mark painted on 
the sides of British ships to denote the 
maximum depth to which they may be 
sunk by loading. There is a "summer 
mark" and a "winter mark," the loads 
permitted for summer being greater be- 
cause the better weather permits less free 
board. The name "Plimsoll" comes from 
the name of the member of Parliament 
who worked for the law. 

Q. — When a ship is said to be 5,000 
tons, does that mean its cargo 
capacity is 5,000 tons? 

A. — That is generally assumed, and, on 
that assumption, various very wild calcu- 
lations have been made and are made by 
laymen. As a matter of fact a ship's 
"tonnage" is really its displacement, that 
is to say, the weight of the water it dis- 
places when afloat. This measurement Is 
used for all warships, which always carry 
their full load. A different method of 
measurement is generally employed in cal- 
culating the tonnage of a merchant ship, 
and as a rule a warship of exactly the 
same size as a merchant ship will be reg- 
istered at a considerably higher tonnage. 
Roughly, but quite roughly, the cargo ca- 
pacity of a boat is just about double its 
registered tonnage. That is, a steamship 
of 5,000 tons register would have a cargo 
capacity of about 10,000 tons. This is a 
case where a quart can apparently be put 
into a pint pot ! 

Q. — Is the draught of the largest 
merchant ships greater than 
that of dreadnaughts? 

A. — The biggest merchant ships are a 
great deal larger than the most powerful 
dreadnaughts, and have a considerably 
deeper draught. The following table com- 
paring pre-war battleships and merchant- 



men, gives the information up to the 
war: — 



bo 
rt 

C 
C 
O 

H 


to 

c 

H-l 


J2 

•-S 

u 

m 


bo 

u 

Q 


ffi a, 


•0 

a, 
in 




Feet. 


Feet. 


Feet. 


Knots. 


Dreadnaught battleship- 








22,500 


545 


88K 


27-5 


27,000 


23 


Battle-cruiser — 










26,350 


660 


86^ 


27-5 


70,000 


34-7 


Titanic — 












46,000 


882 


92K 


34-6 


47,000 


20 


Britannic — 












54,000 


924 


94 


35 


60,000 


23 


Impcrator — 












50,000 


905 


98 


35 


60,000 


22 



Q. — Are French shipyards making 
good shipping losses? 

A. — Apparently nothing very definite 
has been done. The shipbuilders and 
shipowners complain that the Government 
has, as yet, taken no measures to enable 
the shipyards to secure the necessary raw 
materials, and the Committee of Ship- 
owners has decided unanimously "once 
again to call attention to the danger that 
threatens the French merchant marine of 
disappearing, if the shipyards are not in 
a position to construct vessels with the 
shortest possible delay." The Italian Gov- 
ernment appears to be fully alive to the 
need of adding to its merchant marine, 
and voted a sum of 165,000,000 lire ($30,- 
000,000) for the construction of merchant 
vessels during 1917. 

Q. — Are many foreign sailors in the 
British mercantile marine? 

A. — The figures for 1913 were as fol- 
lows : — 

British 212,570 

Lascars and Asiatics 46,848 

Foreigners 32,639 

Of these 70,622 were engaged exclus- 
ively in home trade, 25,000 being on fish- 
ing vessels ; 10,244 were in vessels en- 
gaged partly in home and partly in over- 
sea trade. 

We may assume that practically all 
these 70,000 were British, which would 
leave 142,000 British for foreign trade, 
and 79,000 Lascars and foreigners. It 
appears, therefore, that the proportion in 
the British oversea mercantile marine is 
not quite two British seamen to one for- 
eigner. 



264 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Was the "L-usitania" the fa- 
mous Atlantic "greyhound"? 

A. — Yes. This was the first great Brit- 
ish ship built for the American trade, 
which was fitted with turbine engines. 
She and her sister ship, the Mauretania, 
won the blue ribbon of the Atlantic from 
the Germans, who had held it for some 
years. The Lucania, with the Campania, 
held it before the Germans captured it, 
with the Deutschland, in 1900. The Lusi- 
tania was built in 1907, and displaced 
31,550 tons. The Britannic, sunk in the 
war, had a tonnage of 54>ooo. 

Q. — Did British Colonies limit Ger- 
man ships trading to their 
ports ? 

A. — There was no limitation at all. 
The more ships came into Dominion ports 
the better pleased the Dominions were. 
The German ships carried much cargo 
not only between German ports and the 
Dominions and Colonies, but also be- 
tween Great Britain and the outlying 
parts of the empire. 

German vessels running along the east 
coast of Africa took much of the produce 
of British East Africa to England. 

Much of the West Indian trade between 
British West Indian ports and American 
ports was in German ships, notably the 
trade between New York and Jamaica. 



Q. — How is foreign shipping sub- 
sidized? 

A. — Mostly in the form of guaranteed 
payment for carrying mails. In some 
cases certain lines (mostly passenger-car- 
rying) are subsidized by lump payments 
outright for touching at certain ports or 
performing similar service. The general 
form of subsidy, however, is that of pay- 
ment per mile for carrying mails. It is 
granted usually under conditions prescrib- 
ing the speed, type and general character 
of the ship. The matter of ship subsidies 
has been a vexed problem for generations. 
In one form or another governments of 
maritime nations have always striven to 
encourage a merchant marine under their 
own flag and this encouragement has al- 
most always taken the form of_ grants of 
money in some manner. It is obvious 
that the whole subject has an international 
aspect since an unsubsidized merchant 
marine of one country is handicapped 
against subsidized marines of other coun- 
tries. Subsidies have vehement support- 
ers and equally vehement enemies in every 
country that grants them. There has been 
an enormous output of contentious litera- 
ture but it remains one of the open sub- 
jects of the world. The following tables 
show some foreign subsidies paid before 
the war, as computed by a British 
editor. 



Subsidies Paid to Foreign Steamship Companies 

Eastern Service. 

Voyages Total No. of Amount of 

per Miles Run Subsidy. Subsidy. 

Year. per Year. per Mile. 

NorddeutschCr Lloyd 26 675,246 £171,000 5s. o^d. 

P. and O. Line 26 731,120 164,500 4s. 524d. 

Messageries Maritimes 26 528,372 228,950 8s. 7 Z A&- 

Gesellschaft Nederland 26 494,000 26,500 is. o^d. 

Rotterdamsche Lloyd 26 468,000 26,500 is. l l / 2 A. 

Oesterreichischer Lloyd 12 235,715 34,600 2s.io^d. 

Societa Marthina 13 H7.499 68,400 us. 7 l / 2 d. 

(Genoa-Bombay) 

Nippon Yusen Kaisha 26 639,808 316,900 9s.io34d 



Australian Service. 

Voyages 

per 

Year. 

Norddeutscher Lloyd 13 

P. and O. Line 26 

Orient Line 26 

Messageries Maritimes 13 



Total No. of 




Amount of 


Miles Run 


Subsidy. 


Subsidy. 


per Year. 




per Mile. 


342,420 


£95,000 


5s. 6^d. 


652,860 


146,500 


4s. 554d. 


692,640 


173,400 


5s. 


315.198 


48,760 


3s. id. 



The World's Ships of Peace 



265 



Q. — How fast is our merchant ma- 
rine growing? 

A. — On August 22, 1918, we had 535 
steel and wooden ships with a deadweight 
tonnage of 2,923,973. In the preceding 
week the total deadweight tonnage had 
been 2,840,423 tons. Thus there was a rec- 
ord of 83,550 new tonnage in one week. 
This includes all vessels, seagoing and 
non-seagoing. 

Q. — What had we built during the 
first year of war? 

A. — The Department of Commerce, Bu- 
reau of Navigation, issued the following 
statement of American merchant ship- 
building for the year ended June 30, 1918: 

"Merchant vessels built in the United 
States during the fiscal year ended June 
30, as officially returned to the Commerce 
Department, Bureau of Navigation, num- 
bered 1,622, of 1,430,793 gross tons. The 
output of the preceding four months, 706,- 
084 gross tons, almost equaled that of 
the preceding eight months, and was 
greater than any previous annual output 
in our history. The year's output was 
more than double the largest output of 
German shipyards in peace times. The 
output of the United Kingdom for the 12 
months ended June 30 has not been stated, 
but for the 12 months ended May 31 it 
was 1,406,838 gross tons, or about 70 per 
cent of the annual output of peace times." 



Q. — How many had our govern- 
ment yards produced? 

A. — The year's output up to June 30, 
1918, was almost exclusively from estab- 
lished private shipyards. The great ship- 
building plants like Hog Island, estab- 
lished through Government co-operation, 
had not begun to add finished ships to the 
cargo fleets. By September, however, 
there had been a marvellous production 
that threw these figures into the shade. 
On September 3, 1918, it was announced 
that we had completed in the year 277 
seagoing vessels totalling 1,710,121 dead- 
weight tons. 

Q. — How did our old and new rec- 
ords compare? 

A. — From July 1 to December 31, 1916, 
we built 78 seagoing steel and wood ships 
of 206,203 tons (mostly for foreign own- 
ers). From January 1 to June 30, 1917, 
we built 61 steel seagoing ships of 288,061 
gross tons, 55 wood seagoing ships of 105,- 
687 tons, a total of 393,748 gross tons. 
Adding 778 non-seagoing ships, we built 
in that time 491,983 gross tons. From 
June 30 to December 31, 1917, we built 

81 steel seagoing ships of 317,677 tons, 

82 wood seagoing ships of 106,143 tons, 
642 non-seagoing ships of 118,493 tons, 
making a total for the last 6 months of 
1917 of 805 ships of 542,313 gross ton- 
nage. 



Q. — Were all these ocean-going 
ships? 

A. — Of the year's American output, 253 
of 1,034,604 gross tons were seagoing steel 
steamers, 157 of 213,088 gross tons sea- 
going wooden vessels, and the others were 
vessels for the lakes, rivers, and domestic 
transportation. One concrete seagoing 
steamer of 3,427 gross tons was included. 



Q. — How fast did we build after we 
got started? 

A. — The following table shows what 
ships were built and officially numbered 
in the United States in the first six 
months of 1918. It does not include ships 
that had been launched but not completed 
or registered. 



Seagoing 



Non-seagoing 



Steel 



Wood 



Total 



Grand Total 



No. of Gross No. of Gross No. of Gross No. of Gross No. of Gross 
Ships Tons Ships Tons Ships Tons Ships Tons Ships Tons 



January . 
February 
March . . 
April . . . 

May 

June . . . 



12 
17 

29 
3i 
40 



53,748 

94,242 

115,040 

130,637 

157,598 



6 

14 
12 

15 
13 



6,468 
17,874 
20,776 
21,017 
i6,453 



18 
3i 
41 
46 
S3 



60,216 
112,116 
I35,8i6 
151,654 
174,051 



39 



4,579 57 64,795 



43 165,662 15 24,357 58 190,019 



53 5,485 84 117,601 

97 n,329 138 147,145 

119 11,396 165 163,050 

132 20,413 185 194,464 

130 11,406 188 201,425 



Total . . 172 716,927 75 106,945 247 823,872 570 64,608 817 888,480 



EUROPEAN TRADE ARTERIES 



Q. — Is the Danube the longest river 
in Europe? 

A. — No. The longest is the Volga 
(2,000 miles), a river entirely in Russian 
territory. Authorities differ as to its ex- 
act length. Strelbitsky, the greatest au- 
thority on European rivers, puts it at 
1,977 miles, but General von Tillo, another 
expert, says it is 2,107 miles long. It 
drains a huge area, no less than 560,000 
square miles, and the most fertile part 
of Russia is in this basin, which supports 
no less than 40,000,000 people. It empties 
into the Caspian Sea, but, by means of 
canals linking up with other rivers, it is 
actually connected with the Baltic. 

Q. — How long is the Danube? 

A. — The Danube is 1,644 miles long, but 
has a basin of only 315,000 square miles. 
It is, however, a far more notable stream 
than the Volga, has a much greater dis- 
charge of water, and has an international 
importance greater than any other river 
in the world. 

Q. — What are the next longest Eu- 
ropean rivers? 

A. — The river next in size is the Ural, 
1,446 miles; then the Dnieper, 1,164 miles, 
in whose basin dwell 28,000,000 people ; 
then the Kama, 1,115 miles; then the Don, 
1,110 miles; and then the Pechora, 1,024 
miles. All these are Russian rivers, so, 
too, are the Oka, 914 miles, and the Dnies- 
ter, 835 miles. 

After them comes the Rhine, which is 
only 709 miles long, but the position of 
which makes it second only in importance 
to the Danube among European streams. 

Q. — Is the Danube navigable for 
heavy tonnage? 

A. — The central channel, called the Su- 
lina, is the one now used through the 
Delta. From its mouth to Braila the 
Danube is navigable for sea-going ships 
up to 4,000 tons register. From Braila 
almost to the Iron Gates sea-going ships 
of 600 tons can use the river, and barges 
of some 2,000 tons capacity navigate it. 
From the Iron Gates to Vienna barges 
drawing five feet of water are used. 
From Vienna to Regensberg it is possible 
for barges of 600 tons register to be 
towed up against the rapid stream. A 
canal connects the Danube with the 



Mainz, which flows into the Rhine at 
Mainz. It is said that the Germans are 
already engaged on a scheme for join- 
ing the Rhine and the Danube by a deep 
canal, which will permit the passage of 
very large barges, and thus link the Black 
and the North Seas. 

Q. — How wide and how deep is the 
Rhine? 

A. — At the Swiss frontier it is only 189 
yards wide. At Mannheim it is 429, at 
Mayence 402, at Coblenz 399, at Bonn 532, 
at Cologne 433, at Dusseldorf 409, and at 
the Dutch frontier 909. From Mayence 
to Dusseldorf it varies from 9 to 76 feet 
in depth. Above Mayence it is never 
deeper than 25 feet, and it shoals to as 
little as three feet in places. 

Q. — What is the Rhine Navigation 
Treaty? 

A. — It is a convention which gives to 
Germany the right of conveying ship- 
ments through the Netherlands by way 
of the Rhine without let or hindrance. 
The Dutch authorities are not permitted 
to examine the cargo at all, their privi- 
leges being limited to an examination of 
the ship's papers. 

Q. — Is the Scheldt a Dutch or a 
Belgian river? 

A. — It is a Dutch river. The Scheldt 
enters Holland eleven miles after it leaves 
Antwerp, and runs for fifty miles through 
Dutch territory to the sea. It is, there- 
fore, in Dutch territorial waters, and, 
although it is a trade-free river, its neu- 
trality must be respected. 

Q. — What is a trade-free river? 

A. — A river on which no tolls are 
charged, and which is entirely free to 
the shipping of the world. Up to 1863 
Holland had the right to, and did, levy 
a toll of 3 shillings (about 75 cents) a 
ton on all ships using the Scheldt to reach 
Antwerp. This absolutely throttled the 
port of Antwerp, and, after many at- 
tempts, a conference of twenty-one Pow- 
ers and States held at Brussels, was suc- 
cessful in arranging a treaty freeing the 
Scheldt. Belgium and the other inter- 
ested Powers bought the toll right from 
Holland for about $7,200,000, of which 
sum Belgium paid about $2,400,000. Since 



266 



European Trade Arteries 



267 



then Antwerp has gone ahead by leaps 
and bounds. With its suburbs it had a 
population of about 360,000 before the 
war. Of these, 16,000 were Dutch, and 
10,000 Germans. 

Q. — How long is the Kiel Canal? 

A. — Sixty-one miles, a few miles longer 
than that of Panama. The Suez Canal 
is almost 100 miles long, and cost about 
$125,000,000 to build. The Panama Canal, 
fifty miles long, cost $372,000,000. 

Q. — What was the cost of the Kiel 
Canal? 

A. — The proper name of the canal is 
the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal. Its original 
cost was $39,000,000. The reconstruction 
cost $55,000,000. It was 29J/2 feet deep, 
but has been deepened and widened, so 
that it can take the greatest dreadnaught 
afloat. The sluices at the Baltic end are 
1,072 feet long, and 145 feet wide, and 
are the largest in the world. 

Q. — Who owns the Suez Canal? 

A. — The shareholders of the Egyptian 
Company, which was formed by M. de 
Lesseps to build it. The original capital 
was £8,000,000 in 400,000 shares of £20 
each. France originally took 200,000 of 
these, the Ottoman Empire took 96,000. 
Of the remaining shares the Viceroy of 
Egypt obtained 85,506. England, Aus- 
tria, Russia and the United States would 
have nothing whatever to do with the pro- 
jected canal, the cutting of which was 
strongly objected to by the British Gov- 
ernment. Lord Palmerston told de Les- 
seps, when he went to London to raise 
money, that, in the opinion of British ex- 
perts, the making of a canal between the 
Mediterranean and the Red Sea was a 
physical impossibility, the levels of the 
two seas not being the same. However, in 
1875, when the Khedive of Egypt, being 
hard pressed for money, tried to sell the 
shares he held — those of the former Vice- 
roy and those taken up by the Turkish 
Government — to a French syndicate, the 
British Government stepped in, and pur- 
chased the lot, 176,602 shares in all, for 
£3,976,582. This was about their face 
value at the time. Those shares are now 
worth £30,000,000! 

Q. — Who was responsible for this 
purchase? 

A.— Lord Beaconsfield generally gets 
the credit for this coup, which gave Great 
Britain virtual control of the canal. 



Q. — How do the railways of Eu- 
rope compare? 

A. — According to the latest pre-war 
figures, Germany had 39,000 miles of rail- 
way; France, 31,000; United Kingdom, 
23,420; Russia, 46,000; and Italy, 11,000. 
Since 1880 the total receipts of the Ger- 
man railways have gone up nearly four 
times, and the ton mileage more than 
four times. In that same time the British 
receipts and ton mileage have just about 
doubled. 

Q. — Is the telegraph used as much 
on the Continent of Europe as 
in England? 

A. — Much more than in England. Ger- 
many has 142,000 miles of telegraph line; 
France has 114,000, the United Kingdom 
61,000. There are 50,000 postoffices in 
Germany, 14,000 in France, and 24,000 in 
the United Kingdom. There are 72 _ let- 
ters per head written in Great Britain 
and only 49 per head in Germany. In 
France there are 40, in Russia 10, and in 
Italy 11 per head. 

Q. — What is the line of the Berlin- 
Bagdad Railroad? 

A. — It starts really at the Elbe North 
Sea port of Hamburg, running down Elbe 
valley to Berlin. Thence it goes south- 
ward through Prussian Brandenburg, 
largely continuing along the Elbe val- 
ley. Still directed southward, it crosses 
Saxony, touching the Saxon city, Dres- 
den, and then pierces the Erz Gebirge 
(Ore Mountains), descending into Bo- 
hemia, and passing through the Bohemian 
city of Prague. 

Thence it goes southeasterly to Vi- 
enna. From Vienna it follows the Dan- 
ube valley to Budapest and, passing 
along the northern side of the Danube, 
in Hungarian territory, it goes to the 
Serbian capital Belgrade. 

Continuing southeasterly,_it crosses Ser- 
bia and reaches the Bulgarian capital So- 
fia. Traversing southern Bulgaria, it 
reaches Turkish Adrianople and then Con- 
stantinople. From Haidar-Pasha on the 
Bosporus, opposite Constantinople, it ex- 
tends through Asiatic Turkey into Meso- 
potamia, touching Mosul, and so to Bag- 
dad. 

Q. — When was the Berlin-Bagdad 
Railroad begun? 

A. — It was begun about 1900 when a 
German company obtained concessions 



268 



Questions and Answers 



from the Sultan for the line from Con- 
stantinople to Bagdad. The intention was 
ultimately to extend from Bagdad to the 
Persian Gulf. 

The magnitude of the scheme nat- 
urally led to lively suspicions of schemes 
of aggrandizement and military menace. 



Q. — Does it tap rich country? 

A. — It taps thousands of miles of neg- 
lected country with big possibilities, but, 
to bring these possibilities into being, vast 
projects of reclamation, irrigation, colo- 
nization by agricultural laborers, etc., are 
necessary. Many of these projects had 
been begun when war occurred. 



Q. — Does a direct railroad line con- 
nect Odessa with Bucharest? 

A. — No. A railway runs from Odessa 
to Bender, where the Dniester is crossed ; 
from there it runs south to Reni, on the 
Danube, from which place a boat is 
taken to Galatz, a distance of some eight 
miles. The railway to Bucharest from 
that port runs through Braila, Buzen, and 
Ploesci. Another route can be taken, but 
'it is a long way round, through Kishinef 
— the capital of Bessarabia — to Jassy, 
crossing the frontier to Ungheni, where 
the break of gauge necessitates changing 
trains. From the present capital of Rou- 
rnania, either of the north-south railways 
can be taken to Bucharest. 



Q.— How many miles is it from 
Berlin to Bagdad? 

A. — In direct air-line it is 2,000 miles. 
By rail, when the missing link in the 
Bagdad railway is completed, it will be 
about 2,650 miles. The Germans had 
among other plans the idea of building a 
great bridge across the Hellespont, and, 
if that were done, it would be possible 
to travel in one of the carriages of the 
Compagnie Internationale dcs Wagon 
Lits from Calais in France, on the Eng- 
lish Channel, to Koweit, on the Persian 
Gulf, a distance of some 3,000 miles, with- 
out a change, as the Bagdad railway is 
of standard gauge. 



Q. — Has the Bagdad railway really 
been completed? 

A. — Various statements have been made 
about it. It is known definitely that the 
connecting link through _ the Taurus 
Mountains was completed in 1914, and at 
that time the section from Aleppo to Ras- 
el-ain — 86 miles — was finished. When the 
war broke out, or shortly afterward, the 
rails had been laid from Bagdad to Sa- 
marra, 88 miles. It is probable that the 
link between Ras-el-ain and Mosul (200 
miles) has also been finished, but it is 
improbable that the line from Mosul to 
Samarra, a distance of 160 miles, has 
been laid. 



Q. — Have all railways in Europe 
the same gauge? 

A. — All have the standard 4-ft. 8^-in. 
gauge except Russia, where the gauge is 
5 ft. In Argentine they have the largest 
gauge in the world — viz., 5 ft. 6 in. This 
is due to the fact that the Argentines pur- 
chased the railways and rolling stock 
which were laid down by the British and 
French during the Crimean War The 
gauge used was 5 ft. 6 in. 

Q. — Is the Euphrates a navigable 
river? 

A. — Not for commercial purposes. Sail- 
ing craft manage to traverse it from the 
Persian Gulf to Hit, due west of Bag- 
dad, but beyond that town even they can- 
not go. flit is about 500 miles from 
Kurna, where the Tigris and Euphrates 
meet and flow to the Persian Gulf in one 
stream, known as the Shat-el-Arab. The 
Euphrates rises near Erzerum, and is 
about 1,800 miles long. When the snows 
melt in the Armenian mountains in March 
and April, the river overflows its banks, 
but, otherwise, it is a sluggish stream. 
In November, when the water is low, 
rocks, dams, and shallows make naviga- 
tion exceedingly difficult. 



PRINCE LICHNOWSKY'S REVELATIONS 



Q. — What were the Lichnowsky 
revelations ? 

A. — Prince Karl Lichnowsky, German 
Ambassador at London when war began, 
wrote a diary or "memorandum," which 
by means not disclosed reached the Ger- 
man Minority Socialists and also the 
Stockholm Politiken, organ of the extreme 
wing of the Swedish Socialists. Vor- 
waerts, Politiken and Muenchencr Neueste 
Nachrichten published parts of it early in 
1918. Von Jagow (Foreign Minister when 
war began) made a labored reply in the 
Reichstag. 

Q. — What was the burden of 
Lichnowsky's charges ? 

A. — He declared that during his term 
as Ambassador (from 1912 to 1914) Eng- 
land, through Sir Edward Grey, had been 
sincerely desirous of friendly relations 
with Germany. In regard to the war 
specifically, he charged : "1. We encour- 
aged Count Berchtold to attack Serbia, 
although no German interest was in- 
volved, and the danger of a world-war 
must have been known to us — whether we 
knew the text of the ultimatum is a ques- 
tion of complete indifference. 

"2. In the days between July 23 and 
July 30, 1914, when M. Sazonoff emphat- 
ically declared that Russia could not tol- 
erate an attack upon Serbia, we rejected 
the British proposals of mediation, al- 
though Serbia, under Russian and British 
pressure, had accepted almost the whole 
ultimatum, and although an agreement 
about the two points in question could 
easily have been reached, and Count 
Berchtold was even ready to satisfy him- 
self with the Serbian reply. 

"3. On July 30th, when Count Berch- 
told wanted to give way, we, without 
Austria having been attacked, replied to 
Russia's mere mobilization by sending an 
ultimatum to Petersburg, and on July 
31st we declared war on the Russians, 
although the Czar had pledged his word 
that as long as negotiations continued not 
a man should march — so that ve delib- 
erately destroyed the possibility of a 
peaceful settlement. 

"In view of these indisputable facts, it 
is not surprising that the whole civilized 
world outside Germany attributes to us 
the sole guilt for the world-war." 



269 



Q. — Did he give proofs of Eng- 
land's good will? 

A.— He referred throughout to the 
general spirit in which he was met. Spe- 
cifically, he gave particularly full details 
of practically concluded agreements over 
spheres of influence in the Portuguese 
African colonies and the Bagdad rail- 
road. 

Q. — Did Lichnowsky say Germany 
supported the attack on Ser- 
bia? 

A. — In a part of the memorandum 
printed in Vorwaerts, he wrote that he 
received instructions to "induce the Eng- 
lish press to take up a friendly attitude 
if Austria^gave the 'death blow' to the 
great Serbian movement, and so far as 
possible to prevent public opinion from 
opposing Austria. Recollections of the 
attitude of England during the annexation 
crisis, when public opinion showed sym- 
pathy for the Serbian rights in Bosnia — 
these and other things spoke so strongly 
against the probability of support being 
given to the projected punitive expedi- 
tion against the murderers that I consid- 
ered it necessary to give an urgent warn- 
ing. But I also gave a warning against 
the whole project, which I described as 
adventurous and dangerous. 

"Herr von Jagow answered me that 
Russia was not ready; there would doubt- 
less be a certain amount of bluster, but 
the more firmly we stood by Austria the 
more would Russia draw back. He said 
that Austria was already accusing us of 
want of spirit, and that we should not 
squeeze her. On the other hand, feeling 
in Russia was becoming even rn^re anti- 
German, and so we must simply risk it.*' 

Q.~— What did Lichnowsky say 
about England's attitude on 
Serbia? 

A. — He said : "Sir Edward Grey went 
through the Serbian reply with me, and 
pointed to the conciliatory attitude of the 
Government at Belgrade. We then dis- 
cussed his mediation proposal, which was 
to arrange an interpretation of the two 
points acceptable to both parties. M. 
Cambon (French Ambassador in Lon- 



270 



Questions and Anszvcrs 



don), the Marquis Imperiali (Italian 
Ambassador in London), and I should 
have met under Sir Edward Grey's presi- 
dency, and it would have been easy to 
find an acceptable form for the disputed 
points, which in the main concerned the 
participation of Austrian officials in the 
investigation at Belgrade. Given good- 
will, everything could have been settled in 
one or two sittings, and the mere accept- 
ance of the British proposal would have 
relieved the tension and would have fur- 
ther improved our relations to England. 
I urgently recommended the proposal, 
saying that otherwise world-war was im- 
minent, in which we had everything to 
lose and nothing to gain. In vain ! I was 
told that it was against the dignity of 
Austria, and that we did not want to 
interfere in the Serbian business, but left 
it to our ally. I was told to work for 
'localization of the conflict.' " 

Q. — What happened after the Ger- 
man ultimatum? 

A. — After Germany answered Russian 
mobilization with an ultimatum and then 
a declaration of war, Sir Edward Grey, 
says Lichnowsky, "still looked for new 
ways of escape. In the morning of Aug- 
ust 1st Sir W. Tyrrell came to me to say 
that his chief still hoped to find a way out. 
Should we remain neutral if France did 
the same? I understood him to mean 
that we should then be ready to spare 
France, but his meaning was that we 
should remain absolutely neutral — neutral 
therefore even towards Russia. That was 
the well-known misunderstanding. Sir 
Edward had given me an appointment for 
the afternoon, but as he was then at a 
meeting of the Cabinet, he called me up 
on the telephone, after Sir W. Tyrrell 
had hurried straight to him. But in the 
afternoon he spoke no longer of anything 
but Belgian neutrality, and of the possi- 
bility that we and France should face 
one another armed, without attacking one 
another. 

"Thus there was no proposal whatever, 
but a question without any obligation, be- 
cause our conversation, as I have already 
explained, was to take place soon after- 
ward. In Berlin, however (without 
waiting for the conversation), this news 
was used as the foundation for a far- 
reaching act." 

Q. — Did Grey continue to seek 
peace? 

A. — Lichnowsky writes that after the 
refusal of conference and mediation, Sir 
Edward Grey asked Germany to come 
forward with a proposal. He says : "We 



insisted upon war. I could get no other 
answer than that it was an enormous 
'concession' on the part of Austria to 
contemplate no annexation of territory. 
Thereupon Sir Edward justly pointed out 
that even without annexations of territory 
a country can be humiliated and subjected, 
and that Russia would regard this as a 
humiliation which she would not stand. 
The impression became ever stronger that 
we desired war in all circumstances. 
Otherwise our attitude in a question 
which, after all, did not directly concern 
us was unintelligible. The urgent ap- 
peals and definite declarations of M. 
Sazonoff (Russian Foreign Minister), 
later on the positively humble telegrams 
of the Czar, the repeated proposals of 
Sir Edward, the warnings of San Giu- 
liano (Italian Foreign Minister), and of 
Bollati (Italian Ambassador in Berlin), 
my urgent advice — it was all of no use, 
for Berlin went on insisting that Serbia 
must be massacred. 

"The more I pressed, the less willing 
they were to alter their course, if only 
because I was not to have the success of 
saving peace in the company of Sir Ed- 
ward Grey. 

"So Grey on July 29th resolved upon 
his well-known warning. I replied that 
I had always reported that we should 
have to reckon upon English hostility if 
it came to war with France. The Min- 
ister said to me repeatedly: 'If war 
breaks out it will be the greatest catas- 
trophe the world has ever seen.' " 

Q. — What was the proposed Afri- 
can agreement? 

A. — According to this part of the mem- 
orandum, which was published in the 
Mnenchencr Neueste Nachrichten, it 
amended a treaty between Great Britain 
and Germany which divided the Portu- 
guese colonies of Africa into spheres of 
interest. Lichnowsky's statement is : 

"The object of the negotiations be- 
tween us and England, which had begun 
before my arrival, was to alter and 
amend our treaty of 1898. Thanks to the 
conciliatory attitude of the British Gov- 
ernment, I succeeded in giving to the new 
treaty a form which entirely accorded with 
our wishes and interests. All Angola, as 
far as the 20th degree of longitude, was 
allotted to us, so that we reached the 
Congo territory from the south. More- 
over, the valuable islands of San Thome 
and Principe, which lie north of the 
equator, and therefore really belonged to 
the French sphere of interest, were al- 
lotted to us — a fact which caused my 



Prince Lichnowsky's Revelations 



271 



French colleague to make lively, although 
vain, representations. Further, we ob- 
tained the northern part of Mozambique ; 
the frontier was formed by the Likungo. 
The British Government showed the ut- 
most_readiness to meet our interests and 
wishes. Sir Edward Grey intended to 
prove his good will to us, but he also 
desired to promote our colonial develop- 
ment, because England hoped to divert 
Germany's development of strength from 
the North Sea and Western Europe to 
the world-sea and Africa. 'We don't 
want to grudge Germany her colonial de- 
velopment,' a Cabinet member said to me. 
"Originally, at the British suggestion, 
the Congo State was to be included in the 
treaty, which would have given us a right 
of pre-emption and a possibility of eco- 
nomic penetration in the Congo State. 
But we refused this offer, out of alleged 
respect for Belgian sensibilities ! Per- 
haps the idea was to economize our suc- 
cesses? With regard also to the practical 
realization of the real but unexpressed 
object of the treaty — the actual partition 
at a later date of the Portuguese colonial 
possessions — the new formulation showed 
considerable advantages and progress as 
compared with the old. Thus the treaty 
contemplated circumstances which would 
enable us to enter the territory ascribed 
to us, for the protection of our interests. 
These conditional clauses were so wide 
that it was really left to us to decide when 
really 'vital' interests were concerned, so 
that, in view of the complete dependence 
of Portugal on England, we merely 
needed to go on cultivating our relations 
with England in order, later on, with 
English assent, to realize our mutual 
intentions." 

Q. — What was the contemplated 
Bagdad railroad treaty? 

A. — The Lichnowsky memorandum, as 
published in the Stockholm Politiken, was : 
"It aimed, in fact, at the division of Asia 
Minor into spheres of interest, though 
this expression was carefully avoided in 
consideration of the Sultan's rights. Sir 
Edward Grey declared repeatedly that 
there was no agreement between Eng- 
land and France aiming at a division of 
Asia Minor. In the presence of the 
Turkish representative, Hakki Pasha, all 
economic questions in connection with the 
German treaty were settled mainly in ac- 
cordance with the wishes of the Ottoman 
Bank. The greatest concession Sir Ed- 
ward Grey made me personally was the 
continuation of the line to Basra. Hith- 



erto Bagdad had been the terminus 
of the line. The shipping on the Shat-el- 
Arab was to be in the hands of an inter- 
national commission. We obtained a 
share in the harbor works at Basra, and 
even shipping rights on the Tigris, hith- 
erto the monopoly of the firm of Lynch." 

Q. — Would this have given Ger- 
many what she wanted? 

A. — Yes. As the memorandum says : 
"By this treaty the whole of Mesopotamia 
up to Basra became our zone of interest, 
whereby the whole British rights, the 
question of shipping on the Tigris, and 
the Wilcox establishments were left un- 
touched, as well as all the district of 
Bagdad and the Anatolian railways. 

"The British economic territories in- 
cluded the coasts of the Persian Gulf and 
the _ Smyrna-Aidin Railway, the French 
Syria, and the Russian Armenia. Had 
both treaties been concluded and pub- 
lished, an agreement would have been 
reached with England which would have 
finally ended all doubt of the possibility 
of an Anglo-German co-operation." 

Q. — Was a prophecy made by Lich- 
nowsky? 

A. — Yes. His final remark was : "And 
what result have we to expect from the 
struggle of peoples? The United States 
of Africa will be British, like the United 
States of America, Australia, and 
Oceania; and the Latin States of Europe 
will fall into the same relationship to 
the United Kingdom as the Latin sisters 
of America to the United States. They 
will be dominated by the Anglo-Saxon ; 
France, exhausted by the war, will link 
herself still more closely to Great Britain. 
In the long run, Spain also will not 
resist. 

"In Asia, the Russians and the Jap- 
anese will expand their borders and their 
customs, and the South will remain to the 
British. 

"The world will belong to the Anglo- 
Saxon, the Russian and the Japanese, and 
the German will remain alone with Aus- 
tria and Hungary. His sphere of power 
will be that of thought and trade, not that 
of the bureaucrats and the soldiers. The 
German appeared too late, and the world 
war has destroyed the last possibility of 
catching up the lost ground, of founding 
a Colonial Empire, for we shall not sup- 
plant the sons of Japheth. The program 
of the great Rhodes, who saw the salva- 
tion of mankind in British expansion and 
British imperialism, will be realized." 



EUROPE'S FOOD 



Q. — What rations are allowed to an 
Englishman? 

A. — A system of rationing went into 
effect in London and the English counties 
on meat, butter and margarine on Feb- 
ruary 25, 1918. The allowance for meat 
is 20 ounces per mature person per week. 
Children over 10 are entitled to only one- 
half a pound weekly. 

Meat, butter and margarine may be 
obtained on ration-cards only. On the 
meat cards are four coupons for each. 
Of these only three may be used in buy- 
ing butchers' meats, such as beef, mutton 
and pork. 

The butter and margarine ration is four 
ounces per person weekly. 

Q. — Were meatless days ordered in 
England? 

A. — Not until January, 1918, when 
Lord Rhondda, the Food Controller, 
issued an order applying to all hotels, 
restaurants, boarding houses, and public 
places, to begin forthwith. It specified 
two meatless days weekly — Tuesdays and 
Fridays in the London district, and 
Wednesdays and Fridays in other parts of 
the kingdom. 

It ordered that between the hours of 
5 and 10:30 o'clock in the morning no 
meat, poultry, or game may be consumed 
on any day, and no milk may be con- 
sumed as a beverage except by children 
under ten years of age. 

A guest must provide his own sugar 
for sweetening beverages except that resi- 
dents of hotels, clubs, and boarding 
houses may be supplied with not exceed- 
ing six ounces of sugar weekly for this 
purpose, if they do not possess the ordi- 
nary sugar rations. 

Q. — Had England done anything 
else in food regulation? 

A. — In 1916 it was made illegal for 
bread to be sold unless it were at least 
twelve hours old, and in the shape of a 
one-piece oven bottom loaf, or a tin loaf 
or a roll, no currant, sultana, or milk 
bread to be sold, and no sugar to be used 
in making bread. Bakers were also pro- 
hibited from exchanging new bread for 
old. All bread was to be sold by weight, 
and the loaves had to weigh under 1 
pound or an even number of pounds, and 



loaves not weighing the prescribed 
amount were to be cut up and sold by 
weight. Rolls had to weigh 2 ounces. 

Q. — What was the price for pota- 
toes fixed in Great Britain? 

A. — The fixing of prices created a good 
deal of criticism and protest in England 
and ultimately it was decided that the 
prices named should not be regarded as 
contract prices, but as minimum prices, 
guaranteed by the Government for pota- 
toes of the first quality. Prices were as 
follow: 

£$ 15s. per ton for delivery from De- 
cember 15 to January 31, 1917. 

£6 per ton for delivery in February and 
March, 1917. 

£6 10s. per ton for delivery for the re- 
mainder of the season, for quantities of 
not less than six tons, F.O.B. or F.O.R. 

Q. — Were meat prices high in Eng- 
land in 1918? 

A. — It was reported in March that the 
prices ranged from about 43 cents a 
pound for the best cuts to about 25 cents 
a pound for inferior cuts. 

Q. — Did the British nation's whole 
food cost increase very heav- 
ily? 

A. — England's imports of foodstuffs in 
the whole of 1917 increased $198,500,000 
in cost over the preceding year, the in- 
crease being very largely due to higher 
prices. 

Q. — Is it possible to purchase sugar 
in England without buying 
other provisions at the same 
time? 

A. — It is illegal for anybody to make 
conditional food-sales in Great Britain. 
Food Order, 1917, provides that, except 
under authority of the Food Controller, 
no person may impose any condition, 
when selling any article of food, to neces- 
sitate the purchase of any other article. 
Grocers may not sell any article of food 
in excess of the customer's ordinary re- 
quirements. 



272 



Europe's Food 



273 



Q. — Whence does England draw 
most of her supplies in peace? 

A. — She obtained the following sup- 
plies of wheat in 1913, 1914 and 1915 in 
cwts. : — 



Place. 1913. 

U. S. A. 22,000,000 
Argen- 
tina .. 16,000,000 
India .. . 21,500,000 
Canada 19,000,000 
Russia . 10,700,000 
A'stralia 12,000,000 
Roumania 896,000 
Chile .. 511,000 



1914. 1915. 

34,200,000 41,600,000 



6,500,000 

10,700,000 

31,500,000 

7,200,000 

12,100,000 

343-00O 

51,000 



12,200,000 

13,900,000 

19,700,000 

800,000 

200,000 



Total 102,607,000 102,594,000 88,400,000 

This would seem to suggest that dur- 
ing 1915 England must have drawn on 
her stores for at least 14,000,000 cwts., 
and, therefore, had to enter 1916 with a 
more slender margin between importation 
and consumption than is customary. 

Q. — What foods does England im- 
port and raise? 

A. — It is somewhat difficult to answer 
that question as there are so many items, 
and given in such different measures, 
while no estimate even can be made as 
to the local production of many articles 
of food. The main staples can, however, 
be given : — 

Produced 
in U. K. Imported. 
Tons. Tons. 

Wheat and flour.. 1,600,000 6,100,000 

Butter 84,000 200,000 

Potatoes 5,500,000 200,000 

Cheese 140,000 120,000 

Margarine 70,000 

Sugar 1,800,000 

Maize 2,200,000 

Rice 300,000 

Rabbits ? 20,000 

Beef 800,000 480,000 

Mutton 200,000 250,000 

Bacon and hams.. 390,000 280,000 

Eggs ? 2,225,000,000 

eggs (worth 
£7,300,000). 

The total value of food imports in 1913 
was $1,381,000,000. 

Q. — Just what proportion of wheat 
is imported? 

A. — The Prime Minister told the House 
of Commons in 1916 that between 70 and 



80 per cent of the staple cereal supply 
was imported every year. He said then 
that the existing food stocks were alarm- 
ingly low, and urged that every effort 
should be made to increase that year's 
harvest and the next. If the area under 
cultivation was not increased at once, he 
said, the nation might have to choose be- 
tween diminishing its military efforts and 
underfeeding its population. 

Q. — Were there heavy imports of 
wheat into England during 
1916? 

A. — The imports for what is called the 
harvest year (September 1, 1915, to 
August 31, 1916) were practically the 
same as for the previous one, 1914-15, 
viz., 106,000,000 cwts., as compared with 
110,000,000 cwts. for 1913-14, but the 
home production was 41,500,000 cwts., as 
against 31,300,000 in 1913-14, and 36,700,- 
000 cwts. in 1914-15. During the last five 
months of 1916 viz., from June 17th to 
December 16th, the imports were as fol- 
low: 

June 17- June 17- June 17- 
Dec. 16, Dec. 16, Dec. 16. 

1916. 1915. 1914. 

Cwts. Cwts. Cwts. 

Imports 49,271,200 50,897,000 64,502,300 
Home 
grown 18,416,500 16,059,600 17,876,300 



Total 67,687,700 66,956,600 82,378,600 

It would seem, therefore, that the im- 
ports during the twelve months of 1916 
were a good deal behind those of 1914. 



Q. — Is it true that supplies — nota- 
bly sugar — shipped to the Al- 
lies have been resold to Amer- 
icans? 

A. — Food shipped to the Allies is, from 
the moment of its arrival, under super- 
vision or control of Government agencies. 

In Italy such an agency exists since 
1915, under control of a "Commissary 
General of Supplies." Especially drastic 
regulations govern the use, import and 
export of sugar. 

In France, a special "Ministry of Pro- 
visioning and Maritime Transports" takes 
care of all imports and exports. 

In England the "Ministry of Food" and 
the "Royal Wheat Commission" look 
after such matters. To re-sell supplies 
exported from America to the Allies is, 
therefore, next to impossible. 



274 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Has the amount as well as the 
value of meat imports into 
Great Britain greatly increased 
since war began? 

A.— During 1916, 533,8n tons of frozen 
and chilled meat were imported into the 
United Kingdom, as against 662,925 tons 
in 1915, and 694,427 tons in 1914. It is 
probable that the amount consumed in 
England was nearly the same in 1916 as 
it was in 1914, because large quantities 
were diverted to the British armies on 
the Continent, and do not appear in the 
statistics. The total amount of meat con- 
sumed in 1916, including the home-killed 
supplies, was 1,677,548 tons. The value 
of meat imported in 1914 was £30,059,527 ; 
in 1915, £39,576,930; and in 1916, £36,484,- 
143- 

Q. — What sheep, pigs, and cattle 
are in the United Kingdom? 

A. — In 1914 there were 12,184,505 head 
of cattle; 27,960,000 sheep; 3,952,600 pigs. 
Sheep had increased in number by 200,000 
in 1915, but cattle and pigs had decreased 
to 12,000,000 and 3,860,000 respectively. 
Of the pigs 2,400,000 were in England 
and Wales, 100,000 in Scotland, and 
1,300,000 in Ireland. Ireland had 4,850,- 
000 of the cattle and England 5,300,000. 
There were 1,850,000 horses in 1914 and 
150,000 fewer in 1915. 

Q.— Has the British War Office 
called agricultural laborers un- 
der the Compulsory Service 
Bill? 

A. — Apparently it called up 30,000 men 
before 1917. Lord Derby, the Minister of 
War, says that about 180,000 agriculturists 
have joined the forces since the beginning 
of the war, and that in 1918, 30,000 
men of military age were employed 
on or about the farms of England and 
Wales. From that number the War Office 
had been authorized to take 60,000 men 
who had been refused exemption by the 
tribunals. The War Cabinet, however, re- 
duced this number to 30,000, and pre- 
sumably no more will be taken off the 
land. Obviously it will be difficult for 
the farmers of Great Britain to produce 
increased crops when almost half their 
laborers have gone to France. 

Q. — Are children much used in 
England in agricultural work? 

A.— There has been a good deal of pro- 
test concerning the way in which children 



have been working in the fields, thus los- 
ing many months of their school educa- 
tion at a time when it was most neces- 
sary to them. The need for labor, how- 
ever, induced educational authorities to 
release large numbers of children from 
compulsory attendance at school. The 
Kent Educational Committee, for in- 
stance, in January, 1917, released # 638 
children for agricultural work, and simi- 
lar action has been taken all over the 
country. 

Q. — Could England, Scotland and 
Ireland together produce 
enough to feed the United 
Kingdom? 

A. — Probably they could, but it would 
be at the expense of some of their great 
industries. Millions now engaged in 
manufacturing work would have to go 
on the land. Great estates would have 
to be cut up and up-to-date methods 
would have to be employed. At present 
the United Kingdom produces enough 
wheat to last its people for three, pos- 
sibly four, months. To provide a full 
wheat supply 6,000,000 acres would have 
to be cultivated instead of 1,850,000, acres 
as before the war ; or the yield per acre 
would have to be increased as it was in 
Germany. Sugar beet factories would 
have to be erected and great areas would 
have to be planted with this root crop. 
The dairying industry would have to be 
immensely developed ; fisheries, too ; and 
the working classes would have to revert 
to their one meat-meal a week, to which 
they were accustomed before cold stor- 
age brought lamb, mutton and beef 
within their reach. Thus, to become self- 
supporting, Great Britain would have to 
turn herself into an agricultural country 
and cease to be a great industrial center 
of the world. 

Q. — Does England get much food 
from Holland and Scandinavia ? 

A. — The value of the imports from 
Holland before the war was about £19,- 
000,000, from Denmark about £20,000,000, 
from Norway about £7,000,000, and from 
Sweden about £12,000,000 per annum, _ a 
total of £58,000,000 every year. Practic- 
ally the whole of the imports from Hol- 
land were foodstuffs: Peas, rice, eggs, 
fish, cheese, butter (£1,000,000), mar- 
garine (£2,000,000), sugar (£2,000,000), 
hides, poultry, condensed milk. From 
Denmark too, little but food was im- 
ported, butter accounting for more than 
half the total, the rest being made up of 
eggs, bacon and other dairy produce. 



Europe's Food 



VS 



From Norway the largest food export 
was fish (£938,000 in 1914) ; butter, ice, 
fish-oil together amounted to barely 
£500,000. The chief items were paper, 
wood-pulp, and timber. From Sweden 
not only about £2,000,000 worth of butter, 
eggs, and the like were obtained, but over 
£1,000,000 of iron and iron ore was sent 
from Sweden to Great Britain. Wood- 
pulp, paper and timber amounted to more 
than £8,000,000. 

Q. — Does Great Britain produce 
most of the pork she requires? 

A. — No. She relies heavily upon Den- 
mark, Holland and the United States for 
supplies of bacon, pork and ham. The 
President of the Board of Agriculture 
has, however, urged the breeding of large 
numbers of pigs, and has suggested the 
starting of "Pig Clubs" in every district. 
The object of these clubs is to get in 
touch with those who are willing to keep 
a pig, and to find out to what extent they 
need financial assistance in the purchase 
of the animal. This method had already 
been in good working order for some 
time in Germany. Pigs, there, are always 
very numerous, and form one of the 
greatest meat supplies of the country. 
Some time ago, it is reported, everyone 
able to do so was required to keep a pig. 
The piglet was supplied by the authorities, 
and when it had grown up, was taken 
away, and replaced by another small pig- 
let. In this way, the Germans have 
greatly increased the number of pigs 
available for market throughout the 
whole empire. 

Q. — Why do European nations not 
use more corn? 

A. — They are not accustomed to 
it. What they call "corn" is wheat and 
rye. Their name for our corn is "maize," 
and that, by the way, is the correct name. 
In reading European articles, it is well to 
remember that the word "corn" means 
the real cereals in Europe. Many a 
writer on Europe has made queer mis- 
takes by not being aware of this. 

Q. — Could we not induce them to 
use our corn? 

A. — In 1918 the Europeans decided to 
do so. Their food shortage was such 
that the Allies consented to much greater 
use of corn than had been anticipated. 
The Allied countries normally raise 121,- 
109,000 bushels of corn and import from 
the United States 10,811,000 bushels, and 



.135.670,000 from other sources, their total 
consumption in pre-war times being 266,- 
596,000 bushels. 

Of a crop of 3,124,000,000 bushels the 
United States expected to have a surplus 
of about 370,000,000 bushels, and Canada 
a 62,000,000 bushel surplus. 

Q. — How many nations in Europe 
are self-supporting? 

A. — Every European nation relies to 
some extent upon imports, and if these 
were suddenly to stop, it would entail 
great hardships on certain countries, 
while some would suffer heavily. The 
producing countries could exist after a 
fashion, but in others the people would 
starve quickly. The two countries most 
dependent on supplies from beyond their 
borders are the United Kingdom and 
Italy. Great Britain largely lives on im- 
ported foodstuffs, and gets copper, oil, 
cotton, wool and other essential raw ma- 
terial from overseas. Italy has to rely 
entirely on other countries for coal, and 
imports immense quantities of wheat, 
meat and other foodstuffs. France could 
/exist without imports even more easily 
than Germany has done. Countries like 
Denmark, Holland, Norway and Sweden, 
although they import foodstuffs, probably 
could make shift to support themselves. 
Great poverty would result, however, if 
the condition should last long. 

Almost all these countries lack coal. 
Probably the most self-supporting coun- 
tries in Europe are Spain, Austria-Hun- 
gary, Bulgaria, Serbia, Turkey and Rus- 
sia. Switzerland lives largely on import- 
ed cereals, and has to get coal and other 
minerals from abroad. 

Q. — Has the productivity of France 
decreased since the war? 

A. — There has been a notable decrease. 
Edmond Thery made a special study of 
French agriculture, and published the fol- 
lowing remarkable tables. The first of 
the tables deals with cereals, and is as 
follows (the figures representing thou- 
sands of quintals and covering the total 
production of France) : — 

Years 

Mean Wheat. Rye. Barley. Oats. 

1905-1914 87,970 12,869 9,862 48,995 

1913 86,919 12,715 10,438 51,826 

1914 76,936 n,i47 9,753 46,206 

1915 60,630 8,420 6/)2i 34,626 

1916 58,411 9,116 8,579 41,280 

The second table gives similar figures 



276 



Questions and Answers 



for potatoes, wine, sugar, and is as fol- 
lows : — 

Potatoes. Wine. Sugar. 
Millions Millions Millions 
of of Hecto- of 
Years. Quintals, litres. Kilos. 
Mean 
1905-1914 134 S3 705 

1913 136 44 878 

1914 120 56 717 

1915 94 18 303 

1916 88 33 136 

Thery considers the state of affairs will 
be worse after the war, because of the 
anticipated competition of manufacturers 
and traders for labor. 

Q. — Have the French restricted 
food consumption? 

A. — Yes. M. Heriot, the wonderful 
organizer of Lyons, who was made Food 
Controller in France, issued a decree that 
food consumption must be reduced. Ac- 
cording to this decree no person in any 
public feeding place could be served with 
more than two dishes, only one of which 
could be meat. Apart from these two 
dishes the consumer was entitled to soup 
or hors d'ceuvres, and cheese or dessert, 
but not both. Vegetables, whether cooked 
or raw, were to be counted as separate 
dishes if served separately. In order to 
reduce the consumption of flour, milk, 
eggs and sugar, entremets were sup- 
pressed. All restaurant menus had to be 
radically simplified, and were subject to 
official inspection and control. They 
could not include more than two soups 
and nine dishes, which were as follow : 
One dish of eggs of various sorts, two 
varieties of fish, three varieties of vege- 
tables. 

Q. — Is less French land cultivated 
now than before the war? 

A. — Under wheat in the early part of 

1917 there were 4,207,530 hectares, as 
against 5,205,620 in 1916, which was less 
than normal. Under millet there were 
84,485 hectares, as against 101,205 in 
1916; under rye 809,735 hectares, as 
against 925,600 in 1916, and under oats 
2,605,070 hectares, as against 3,044,760 in 
1916. Only in barley was there a slight 
increase, 596,705 hectares in 1917 to 586,- 
285 in 1916. The average yield per hec- 
tare was much less. 

Q. — Does Chile export wheat? 

A. — Chile once supplied Argentine and 
California with wheat, but after these 
countries became producers themselves 



the Chilean output declined. The value 
of the wheat exported the year before 
the war was about $5,000,000. Most of 
it went to Great Britain. 

Q. — When were the European 
sugar bounties abolished? 

A. — They were abolished by the Con- 
vention of Brussels in 1902. An object 
of this Convention was to put an end to 
the bounty war for the British market, 
which the Continental Poweif; had been 
waging among themselves. In England 
it was hoped that the sugar cane growers 
of the West Indies would benefit. The 
Continental Powers agreed to the aboli- 
tion of the bounties only on the distinct 
understanding that special tariffs equal 
to the bounty should be levied on sugar 
produced in countries not signatories to 
the Convention. Great Britain, however, 
in 1908, when the treaty came up for 
renewal, declared that she would sign 
only if she were allowed to import boun- 
ty-fed sugar on the same terms as she 
imported sugar not bounty-fed. The 
Continental Powers strongly protested, 
but only by being relieved from the un- 
dertaking to penalize bounty-fed sugar 
would Great Britain re-sign the Conven- 
tion. 

Q. — Did the price of sugar go up 
in England in consequence? 

A. — In 1902 the price of sugar f.o.b. 
Hamburg was 6s. 7^d. per cwt. ; next 
year it went up to 8s. 3%d., and in 1908 
it was 10s. 5^d. In this connection it is 
worth quoting what Mr. Chamberlain said 
on the question of sugar, before he be- 
came a protectionist : — 

"The policy which this country has 
been applying for many years is to pre- 
fer the large consuming interests of the 
whole community to the small producing 
interest of any single class. ... It is to 
the interest of the sugar consuming pub- 
lic to have raw and refined sugar cheap ; 
it is to the interest of the English sugar 
refineries to have raw sugar cheap and 
refined sugar dear, and it is to the interest 
of the West India sugar growers to have 
raw sugar dear." 

Q. — Did Germany pay larger boun- 
ties than any other country? 

A. — The French bounties were the 
highest of all, averaging 4s. 6d. per cwt. 
Then came the Russian with 3s. ; then 
the German with is. 6d. ; and then the 
Austrian with is. 3d. 



Europe's Food 



277 



Q. — Give particulars as to where 
sugar imported into Great 
Britain before the war came 
from? 

A. — The cane sugar was all imported 
raw. The following figures were for 
1910: — 

Raw Cane Sugar. 

Tons. 

Java 118,304 

Cuba 96,332 

Peru 46,206 

Brazil 51,469 

Mauritius ' 4 I ,739 

West Indies 7^,737 

Other countries 120,504 

Total , 553,291 

Raw Beet Sugar. 

Tons. 

Russia 93 

Germany 229,970 

Holland 20,294 

Belgium 10,996 

France 436 

Austria 57,9i8 

Total 319,707 

Great Britain, however, got most of 
her sugar ready refined, and practically 
all of this was made from beet. The 
imports were as follows : 

Tons. 

Russia 2,289 

Germany 325,792 

Holland 118,161 

Belgium 49,46o 

France 60,987 

Austria 199,466 

Other countries 80,707 

Total 836,862 

The value of the raw cane sugar was 
£6,689,345; of the raw beet sugar, £3,728,- 
931 ; and of the refined sugar, £13,161,023, 
in the two years 1909 and 1910. 



Q. — Was all this sugar consumed 
in the United Kingdom? 

A. — Great Britain exported in 1910 
31,416 tons of refined sugar, and con- 
sumed 1,728,730, of which 1,166,569 tons 
were beet sugar and 562,161 tons cane 
sugar. The year 1910 is hardly a truly 
representative one, as there was a bad 
drought in Europe, and sugar was scarce. 
In 1909 1,467,764 tons of beet sugar were 
consumed in the United Kingdom, and 
292,393 tons of cane sugar. 



Q. — What sugar was imported into 
the United Kingdom before 
war? 

A. — 27,900,000 cwts. in 1910, 30,300,000 
cwts. in 191 1, 26,600,000 cwts. in 1912, 
and 31,100,000 cwts. in 1913. Just over 
half of the annual import came from 
Germany and Austria. Beet sugar was 
also imported from Holland and Russia. 
Cane sugar was obtained from the West 
Indies and India. It is interesting to 
note, though, that, although the British 
West Indies are regarded as mainly 
sugar-growing countries, the value of 
their cocoa and fruit exports is greater 
than that of their sugar nowadays. 

Q. — Were American food-savings 
an important factor in Europe's 
supply? 

A. — They were a decisive factor on the 
Allied side. In the winter of 1917, when 
it was learned that the American wheat 
surplus had been used up, a prominent 
Englishman was reported to have cabled 
Mr. Hoover: "We are beaten; the war 
is over." Yet the savings through wheat- 
less days and war-breads made it possible 
to send across 20,000,000 bushels of 1917 
wheat considered necessary for home con- 
sumption. Our voluntary rationing 
added probably a total of 150,000,000 
bushels to the wheat supplies of our 
Allies, besides vast quantities of beef 
and pork. 

Here is the record : 

Pounds. 
Shipments of meats, fats and 

dairy products, 1916-17.... 2,166,500,000 
Shipments of meats, fats and 

dairy products, 1917-18 3,011,100,000 

Increase 844,600,000 

Bushels. 

Cereals and cereal products, 

1916-17 259,900,000 

Cereals and cereal products, 

1917-18 340,800,000 

Increase 80,000,000 

"I am sure," says Mr. Hoover, "that all 
the millions of our people, agricultural as 
well as urban, who have contributed to 
these results should feel a very definite 
satisfaction. . . . 

"It is difficult to distinguish between 
various sections of our people — the homes, 
public eating-places, food trades, urbanor 
agricultural populations — in assessing 
credit for these results, but no one will 
deny the dominant part of the American 
women." 



278 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — What have European countries 
done about the use of alcohol? 

A. — France and Italy abolished the fa- 
mous and deadly drink kown as absinthe, 
Russia prohibited the noted distilled 
brandy-like drink known as vodka. 
Great Britain greatly limited brewing. 

Q. — Was drunkenness in England 
really great? 

A. — The figures of convictions for 
drunkenness in the sixteen English cities 
which have a population of over 200,000 
show a notable decrease since the war. 
In the year 1913 the convictions in these 
sixteen large towns were 107,316. In 

1915 the convictions were 80,091, and in 

1916 they were 46,638. In London the 
drop has been from 65,488 in 1913, to 
2 9,453 in 19 f 6. In Liverpool the con- 
victions in 1913 were 14,894 and in 1916 
only 5,926. Of course millions^ of men 
have gone into the army, but this is to a 
great extent balanced by the fact that the 
working classes have been fully employed 
at high wages, which in fact, in ordinary 
circumstances, would tend to increase 
drunkenness; so that the decrease may 
reasonably be credited to the way in 
which the sale and consumption of liquor 
have been regulated. 

Q. — Was the decrease due mostly 
to restrictions on liquor? 

A. — Notably. The Central Control 
Board states that during the five years 
1909-13, there was a steady rise in the 
number of convictions for drunkenness. 
A rapid decline set in immediately after 
the orders of the Board came into op- 
eration. In December, 1913, the total con- 
victions in the London areas numbered 
5,701 ; in December, 1914, they were 
5,295; in December, 1915, they were 3,105- 
In February, 1916, they had fallen to 
2,506. From statistics gathered by the 
Board it would seem that the reduction 
of drunkenness throughout England was 
from 40 to 50 per cent. Results in Scot- 
land had not been so satisfactory. The 



Board was taking special steps to deal 
with the increase of drunkenness among 
women, especially those in receipt of 
separation allowances. 

Q. — Was the English order for re- 
strictions of beer intended for 
temperance? 

A. — Lord Devonport in explaining it 
specifically stated that the object was to 
increase the amount of certain commodi- 
ties available for food, and to economize 
in tonnage, transport, fuel and labor. 
During the last few years, owing to vari- 
ous restrictions, the consumption of beer, 
wines, and spirits had been falling rapidly 
in the United Kingdom, but the consump- 
tion of other beverages showed a corre- 
sponding increase. The Board of Trade 
returns give the imports of tea, coffee and 
cocoa, as follow : — 

Tea. Coffee. Cocoa (raw) 

lbs. cwts. lbs. 

I9 J 3 •• 365,000,000 847,000 78,000,000 

1916 .. 377,000,000 1,647,000 196,000,000 

The imports of tea in 1915 reached an 
even higher figure, the amount being 431,- 
000,000 pounds. That is to say, that in 
1916 room had to be found in ships for 
2,000,000 cwts. more tea, coffee and cocoa 
than in the year before the war. 

Q. — Did restrictions on beer in 
England save much barley? 

A. — According to Lord Devonport the 
regulations, which reduced the output of 
beer to 50 per cent of the pre-war total, 
saved 286,000 tons of barley, 36,000 tons 
of sugar, and 16,500 tons of grits. It was 
really, he said, a question of bread versus 
beer. The regulation actually provided 
for the malting of 70 per cent only of 
the output of beer for the financial year 
ending on March 31, 191 7, which is 
equivalent to a reduction of 50 per cent 
on the pre-war production. Before the 
war the output was 36,000,000 standard 
barrels; for 1917 it was expected to be 
18,200,000 only. 



AMERICA'S FOOD 



Q. — Did the Food Board under took more than half of the entire total 

Hoover have power to fix retail £ r enou s h to f 5 ed .f u bout 8,000000 men, 

? c France was next, with enough for 4,200,- 

pnces. 000 men> anc j j ta j y sumc i en t for more 

A. — No. Congress declined to give than 2,000,000. men. The three together 

such powers, and it is probably correct received an excess of protein capable of 

to say that the Administration did not supplying this portion of the diet to 

strongly desire them, because of com- some 20,000,000 additional men. 
plications and opposition that could be 

foreseen readily enough. V- — Dl d we ship much food abroad 

in February, 191 8? 

Q.— How, then, did the Govern- A.— The exports of grains and cereals, 

ment succeed in regulating re- including flour, to the Allied nations and 

tail dealers? f° r Belgium relief work totaled 553,425 

. T ,., . <( ,„ ., . (( tons for the month of February, 1918. 

A— It did not^ succeed, if by sue- A tabulation of the exports of grains 

ceed you mean m keeping retail prices and cer eals by weeks was : 

down to prescribed levels. It did, how- Tons 

ever, succeed in a very large sense, for p eD 1 to 7.. 846^8 

it established not only a strong and in- p e tj' g to 14!!! iso'oq 1 ; 

telligent public opinion but also a general Feb. 15 to 21.'.! 14V82Q 

clear perception among the retail mer- Feb. 22 to 28.'. ..'.'..'.'.'.'. ...'.'...'. 174847 

chants of the whole country that they * ' 

must exercise discretion and moderation. Total 557420 

Q.— Did the Food Board exercise Q._Did our total food exports rise 

only moral influence? in 1917? 

A.— Technically and legally speaking, A.— The Bureau of Domestic and For- 
yes. But in actuality Hoover's machinery eign Commerce reported early in 1918 
had a very real and very powerful wea- that during 1917 dairy and meat product 
pon to compel observance of rules that exports had jumped to new high figures 
had no statute law behind them. This but cereal exports had declined. The ex- 
weapon lay in the legal control which ports of meat, dairy products and food 
Congress had given to the Food Board animals in 1917 exceeded $400,000,000, 
over the wholesale system of food sup- against less than $150,000,000 in the year 
plies. Under a licensing system for before the war, and against $255,000,000 
wholesalers, the Food Board was able, in in the high record year 1916. Part of 
actual practice, to divert supplies from this increased value is due, of course, to 
retail dealers who transgressed the rules, the vastly higher prices; but the actual 

quantities have increased enormously. 

Q. — How many European soldiers The exports of wheat for 1917 were 106,- 

COuld we feed? 202,318 bushels, for which the foreign 

interests paid $245,633,541. These exports 

A.— The Food Administration an- were 48 million bushels less than for 

nounced in March, 1918, that food suf- 1916. Total shipments of corn in 1917 

ficient to furnish a balanced ration to an were 52,169,583 bushels, against 55,548,- 

average of more than 16,000,000 men 298 bushels in 1916. 
yearly was shipped from the United 

States from the beginning of the war to Q. — What quantity of flour did we 

January 1, 1918, to Great Britain, France, ship since war began? 

Italy, and Russia. In addition, there was , "" 5 

a surplus of some 625,000 tons of protein A.— The total exports of wheat and 

and 268,000 tons of fats. wheat flour to Great Britain, France, and 

Italy were equivalent to 384,000,000 bush- 

Q.—How was this apportioned? els ' or an average of 110,000,000 bushels 

* rr per year. Exports of pork and pork 

A. — Russia received less than 1 per products totaled almost 2,000,000,000 

cent of the total, or only enough to feed pounds, while sugar exports to those 

about 10,000 men a year. Great Britain countries showed a yearly average of 

279 



28o 



Questions and Answers 



648,000,000 pounds. Oats exports for the 
three and one-half years totaled 212,751,- 
000 bushels, corn 24,310,000 bushels, and 
rye 3,618,000 bushels. 

Q. — Did we do equally well with 
meat exports? 

A. — Exports of fresh beef amounted to 
443,484,000 pounds in the three and one- 
half years, while exports of butter to- 
taled 29,000,000 pounds, cheese 103,500,000 
pounds, and condensed milk 126,000,000 
pounds. Cottonseed, linseed, and other 
oil products and by-products to be used 
for feeding cattle, totaled 611,000,000 
pounds. 

Q.— What are "Farm Loans"? 

A. — To relieve farmers from the high 
interest charges levied by private interests 
when they need loans, a Federal Farm 
Loan Act was passed in 1916. It estab- 
lished 12 Federal Land Banks and these 
banks lend money to the farmers on se- 
curity which is provided as follows : in 
any place farmers may form a farm loan 
association and this association can go to 
a Federal Loan Bank and obtain loans on 
mortgages laid on the farm property. 
These loans may run from 5 to 40 years 
and are at 6 per cent or less. The Fed- 
eral Farm Loan Banks get their funds 
by selling to the investing public bonds 
secured by the mortgages. 

Q. — Has this method been success- 
ful? 

A. — It was most successful. Up to 
August, 1918, more than 51,000 farmers 
had obtained loans averaging $2,200 each, 
and the aggregate of loans actually closed 
was $117,249,000. 



Q. — What was the effect of the war 
on American agricultural 
values ? 

A. — Farm products of the United 
States reached the unprecedented value 
of $19,443,849,381 during 1917, an in- 
crease of more than $6,000,000,000 over 
1916 and almost $9,000,000,000 more than 
in 1915. The estimate shows crops were 
valued at $13,610,462,782 and represented 
70 per cent of the value of all farm prod- 
ucts. Animals and animal products were 
valued at $5,833,386,599 in 1917, an in- 
crease of almost $1,500,000,000 over 1916. 



Q. — Which States profited most 
from the rise in agricultural 
values ? 

A. — Value of all farm crops for 1917 by 
states, not including the value of animals 
and animal products, shows Illinois first, 
Texas second, and Iowa third. In 1916 
Texas led, with Iowa second and Illinois 
third. 

Illinois is the banner farm crop state. 
The value of her crops last year exceed- 
ed that of Texas, which carried away the 
honor in 1916. Iowa's crops were slightly 
under those of Texas in value last year. 
Iowa was in second place in 1916, with 
Illinois third. 

Q. — How do our States rank agri- 
culturally? 

A. — We give the states in geograph- 
ical order. The number following each 
state name indicates its rank in agricul- 
ture as compared with the rest: Maine 
37 ; New Hampshire 46 ; Vermont 42 ; 
Massachusetts 38; Rhode Island 48; Con- 
necticut 39; New York 12; New Jersey 
34; Pennsylvania 13; Delaware 44; 
Maryland 31; Virginia 22; West Vir- 
ginia 30; North Carolina 11 ; South Caro- 
lina 15; Georgia 6; Florida 33; Ohio 4; 
Indiana 8; Illinois 1; Michigan 21; Wis- 
consin 17; Minnesota 9; Iowa 3; Mis- 
souri 5 ; North Dakota 27 ; South Dakota 
18; Nebraska 7; Kansas 14; Kentucky 
16; Tennessee 26; Alabama 25; Missis- 
sippi 19 ; Louisiana 24 ; Texas 2 ; Okla- 
homa 23 ; Arkansas 20 ; Montana 35 ; 
Wyoming 40; Colorado 28; New Mexico 
43 ; Arizona 45 ; Utah 41 ; Nevada 47 ; 
Idaho 63; Washington 29; Oregon 32; 
California 10. 

Q. — How much of our increase was 
new wealth? 

A. — The new wealth produced on the 
farms in 1917 ($19,443,849,381) compares 
with former years as follows : 

Animals and 

Crops. products. 

1917 $13,610,462,782 $5,833,386,599 

1916 9,054,458,922 4,351,905,089 

1915 6,907,186,742 3,868,303,670 

1914 6,111,684,020 3,783,276,511 

1913 6,132,758,962 3,716,753,549 

Q. — When did American agricul- 
ture begin to prosper? 

A. — In the period following 1897, when 
prices were just beginning to rise from 
their preceding generation of declines, 



America's Food 



281 



consequent upon the opening up of the 
great West to surplus grain and animal 
production. 

Q. — Did our agricultural values rise 
steadily from that time? 

A. — Almost without a break. The only 
pause was in 191 1, which produced a 
smaller crop in value than 1910. The 
values of all farm produce in 1917 were 
nearly five times what they were in 1897, 
twenty years before, while those of ani- 
mals and their products were four times 
as large. In the same period, the general 
average of all commodities rose by 156 
per cent ; or, in other words, prices in 
1917 were one and one-half times what 
they were twenty years before. 

Q. — Did prices for foodstuff to the 
consumer go up steadily too? 

A. — Not quite so steadily. In 1901 
there was a drop from the preceding 
year; in the depressed year 1904 there 
was another decline, which was not re- 
covered until 1915. 

Q. — Is wheat our most valuable 
crop? 

A. — No. In America corn is king. In 
1917, corn, with a value of $4,053,672,000, 
led all other crops. 

Q. — Did wheat come next in value? 

A. — No. Wheat comes almost last. 
The crop next in value to corn is cotton, 
with a value of $1,517,558,000 in 1917. 
Then come hay, valued at $1,359,491,000; 
wheat, worth $1,307,427,000, and oats, 
worth $1,061,427,000. 

Q. — Did our live stock increase or 
decrease after we joined the 
war? 

A. — Live stock in the United States on 
January 1, 1918, was valued at $8,263,524,- 
000, the Department of Agriculture an- 
nounced. That was an increase of $1,527,- 
912,000 over the year before. 

Q. — How do prices to-day of sugar, 
eggs, corn, wheat, cotton, but- 
ter, beans, cattle, hogs, etc., 
compare with the prices of 
Civil War days? 

A. — Prices of these foods increased 
much more rapidly than in this war, av- 
eraging then probably 250 per cent more 
than normal. In Civil War days the 



price of sugar increased from 5 cents to 
35 cents a pound, eggs from 14^ to 46 
cents per dozen, corn meal from 3% to 
8% cents per pound, wheat from 94 cents 
to $2.16 per bushel, cattle from $3.37^ 
to $9.50 per hundred pounds, butter from 
T 5^ to 55 cents per pound, beans from 
ZYz to II J^ cents per pound, cotton from 
i$ l /i cents to $1.64 per pound, hogs from 
$4.18 to $15.60 per hundred pounds. 

Q. — What caused the higher prices 
in Civil War days? 

A. — The enormous increases in prices 
during Civil War days were almost en- 
tirely due to the speculative operations 
and to the inflation of the currency and 
depreciation of the dollar. No taint was 
attached to persons who made money out 
of food speculations in those days. It is 
also happily true that higher political and 
commercial ideals by American business 
men to-day made possible the United 
States Food Administration which in- 
duced business men to voluntarily keep 
prices down without legal compulsion. 

Q. — What commodity increased 
most in price in Civil War 
days? 

A. — Alcohol, which went from 37 cents 
to $4.75 per gallon. The same percentage 
of increase to-day would make alcohol 
sell for $43.63 per gallon, instead of its 
present price of $3.75. 

Q. — Why does the Food Adminis- 
tration emphasize the saving 
of meat, wheat, sugar and fats 
only? Are not potatoes, beans, 
corn, etc., just as important 
foods? 

A. — Because the first four food prod- 
ucts are the most compact food products 
that exist in large quantities. In ship- 
ping food to Europe we must pack every 
cubic yard of cargo-space with the maxi- 
mum quantity of food it will hold. 

Q. — Was the world's wheat yield 
in 1916 less than in 1915? 

A. — It was about 240,000,000 cwts. less 
in 1916 than in 1915. 

Q. — What was the total grain pro- 
duction of the world in 191 6? 

_ A. — Excluding the crops of enemy na- 
tions, particulars of which are not avail- 
able, the total production of wheat, rye, 
barley, oats and maize in the northern 



282 



Questions and Answers 



and southern hemispheres in the year 
1916-17 amounted to 243,321,414 tons, a 
decrease of 50,795,383 tons, compared with 

1915, and 19,145,481 tons less than the 
average for the five years 1911-1915, the 
percentage decline being in each case 17.3 
and 7.3 respectively. 

Q. — What is the American wheat 
supply? 

A. — The wheat crop of the United 
States for 1917 was estimated by the 
September forecast at 668,000,000 bushels, 
as compared with 640,000,000 bushels in 

1916. Both of these yields are below 



the five-year average of 806,000,000 bush- 
els. The normal demand for seed and 
domestic consumption in the United 
States is about 600,000,000 bushels, which 
would leave available only 68,000,000 
bushels for exportation to the Allies and 
to neutrals. 

Wheat exports for the year ending in 
June, 1917, were 149,837,427 bushels, of 
which 144,486,749 went to the Allied pow- 
ers and to European neutrals. To this 
must be added 11,942,505 barrels of wheat 
flour, 7,366,294 of which were sent to 
Europe. 

The needs of the Allies annually, at 
the lowest conservative estimate, are 
550,000,000 bushels of wheat. 






THE WORLD'S RAW MATERIALS 



Q. — Where is warring America 
weak in minerals? 

A. — The war strength of a country de- 
pends upon the developed mineral re- 
sources within her own borders. 

Our mineral industry is equal to all the 
war demands upon it in all but seven 
products. These are : potash, nitrogen, 
manganese, nickel, tin, platinum and py- 
rites, while a stringency is felt in regard 
to mica, graphite and a few lesser min- 
erals. 

Q. — How about potash? 

A. — Potash is an indispensable fertiliz- 
ing material. Three years ago, Germany 
held a world monopoly of this substance. 
The United States Government, fortu- 
nately, through its research bureaus, 
found sources of domestic supply. As a 
result, America's potash production, 
which made a modest bow in 1915, for 
the first half of 1917 had risen to 14,000 
tons, valued at nearly $6,000,000. The 
greatest single source, supplying one- 
third, was contributed by the Nebraska 
Alkali lakes. A further increase is ex- 
pected from the newly discovered de- 
posits of Searles Lake. Had the war 
come five years earlier, America would 
have been involved in a potash famine. 

During the year, the United States will 
produce scarcely more than 12 per cent 
of her normal potash needs. 

Q. — How can we get nitrogen? 

A. — Nitrogen is even more important to 
us than potash, for, aside from its use 
in agriculture, it forms the basis of all 
explosives. Chile has supplied the United 
States with nitrogen for fifty years (from 
nitrate (guano) deposits), but it may be 
obtained from the atmosphere and coal. 

In countries lacking coal or with abun- 
dant water power, the air is the most pro- 
lific source of nitrogen. Where coal is 
plentiful, and where an iron industry re- 
quires considerable coke, coal is the most 
logical source of supply. 

Coke is coal from which nitrogen and 
other volatile constituents have been ex- 
tracted. Although the latter conditions 
exist in America, we send $20,000,000 to 
Chile for nitrogen salts, while we waste 
in our coke industry that value of nitro- 
gen as well as other valued by-products. 

The Government in 1916 authorized a 



plant to extract atmospheric nitrogen at 
a cost of $20,000,000. A complete recov- 
ery of nitrogen in the coke industry 
would have more completely placed the 
United States on an independent basis 
with regard to its nitrogen needs. 

Q. — Where are the Chilean nitrate 
deposits situated? 

A. — In the northern provinces of Tac- 
na, Tarapaca, Antofagasta and Atacama. 
The first two were taken from Peru in 
the war of 1879-82. By the terms of the 
treaty of 1884, Tacna was placed under 
Chilean authority for ten years only, 
after the lapse of which period the in- 
habitants were to decide by referendum 
whether they wished to remain Chilean or 
revert to Peru. Chile has consistently 
blocked any attempt to put the referendum 
on the ground that all the present inhab- 
itants must vote. Peru insists that only 
those who lived there when the treaty 
was made should be consulted. The 
situation thus developed is somewhat like 
that which would complicate a referen- 
dum in Alsace and "Lorraine. A further 
similarity is caused by the fact that the 
Germans have developed the iron mines 
in that province immensely, and to do 
that have brought in great numbers of 
Teutons, whose vote would have impor- 
tant weight. The Chileans have devel- 
oped the huge nitrate deposits, and to 
do that have brought in Chilean laborers, 
who would no doubt vote for inclusion 
in Chile. As the Chilean war against 
Peru had as object the acquisition of 
these valuable deposits, the Chileans are 
not likely to part with them. 

Q. — How much saltpeter does Chile 
export annually? 

A. — Nitrate is the chief export of the 
country. The quantity sent away has 
steadily increased year by year — 1907, 
1,650,000 metric tons; 1909, 2,309,000 tons; 
1913, 2,600,000 tons. Since the war the 
export has, of course, fallen off, as Ger- 
many, which took more than any other 
country, was isolated, and could get no 
supplies. The total value of the 1913 ex- 
port was $100,000,000, of which some $10,- 
000,000 worth went to Great Britain. The 
royalty collected by the Chilean Govern- 
ment on the nitrate of soda produced 
yields about $20,000,000 a year, and is one 
of the chief sources of national revenue. 



283 



284 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — How did ship shortage af- 
fect our war material supply? 

A. — Very gravely, because, owing to 
non-development of our own native re- 
sources, we depend sadly on all parts of 
the world for all sorts of basic ores with 
out which our steel and industries are 
practically helpless. Thus, ferro-man- 
ganese, an absolutely essential alloy for 
high-grade steel, must be brought from 
Europe and Brazil. Tungsten, necessary 
for good tool steel, comes from China 
and South America. Tin comes from 
England, the Straits Settlements in the 
Far East and Bolivia. We have to draw 
our chromite (without which we cannot 
make perfect armor-plate or projectiles) 
from South Africa and the South Seas, 
shipping it sometimes almost around the 
world to get it. Graphite, which we must 
have for crucibles in making crucible 
steel, comes from Africa and India. 
Mica, indispensable for insulation in elec- 
trical apparatus, comes to us from India. 
We draw zinc from Australia and sul- 
phur, a fundamental for explosives, from 
China and Europe. 

Q. — Could American mines pro- 
duce all the basic raw mate- 
rials we need? 

A. — Secretary Lane of the Department 
of the Interior said in 1918 that we im- 
port about 2,000,000 long tons a year of 
minerals which our own mines might pro- 
duce, if the Federal government gave the 
necessary assistance. He enumerated 
among the metals so imported, which are 
necessary to manufacture war munitions, 
sulphur, manganese, graphite, tin, mer- 
cury, tungsten, antimony, chromite, mag- 
nesite and mica. The United States pro- 
duces some of these, but not in sufficient 
quantities. It has deposits of others of 
the enumerated minerals which have not 
been commercially profitable to work be- 
cause of their nature. Some of these, Mr. 
Lane thinks, might be made profitable by 
the application of very modern scientific 
methods. 

Q. — Where are nickel and platinum 
- found? 

A.— New Caledonia, in the South Pa- 
cific, produces most of the world's supply 
of nickel, but Canada has furnished us 
with a great part of what we need. 

The world is very "hard up" for plati- 
num, which we need badly for electric ap- 
pliances and for other immediate war pur- 
poses. Russia had been furnishing 93 per 
cent of the world's total output before the 



war, from her gold deposits in the Ural 
Mountains. This has been cut off. The 
Sudbury district in Canada has some in 
its nickel deposits, and there is some in 
Bolivia. 

Q. — What countries exported most 
coal before war? 

A. — The principal coal exports of the 
world in 1913, including that used for 
bunker purposes, were : Great Britain, 
93,000,000 tons ; Germany, 40,000,000 ; 
United States, 29,000,000 ; Austria-Hun- 
gary, 9,000,000 ; Belgium and Canada, 
about 5,500,000 each ; Netherlands, slightly 
less than 5,000,000; Japan, nearly 4,000,- 
000; British South Africa, 2,500,000, and 
Australia, 2,000,000. 

It must be noted that these figures do 
not mean that Holland is a coal-exporting 
country. Holland has a few coal mines 
but would not send any coal away were 
it not for the necessity of coaling the 
ships that call at her ports. Holland is 
dependent on other countries for coal, as 
a matter of fact. 

Q. — How did the war change the 
coal situation? 

A. — With the cutting off of Germany's 
export trade, the United States took sec- 
ond rank as a coal exporter, though far 
behind Great Britain. 

Q. — Whence does Holland now 
draw her coal? 

A. — She is obliged to get it from Ger- 
many, as England has none to spare ; but 
in normal times she drew three-fourths 
of her supplies from the coal mines of 
Great Britain. In those days she re- 
quired 10,000,000 tons annually. Now, 
however, she has to do with much less, 
and many factories have been closed in 
consequence. Germany uses her coal as a 
lever to compel the Dutch to send her 
supplies of food, just as she does with 
Switzerland. 

Q. — What was the total amount of 
coal exported by all countries 
before war? 

A. — The total amount of coal passing 
out of the coal producing countries of the 
world in 1913 was about 200,000,000 tons, 
of which about 40,000,000 tons was bunker 
coal, supplied to vessels engaged in inter- 
national trade for their use on the oceans, 
while a considerable percentage of that 
recorded as exports went to the world's 
coaling stations, where it was supplied to 
steamers. 



The World's Razu Materials 



285 



Q. — How much of the coal supply 
is used by ships? 

A. — The coal burned by steam vessels 
on the oceans aggregates in normal 
times about $200,000,000 a year in value 
out of a total of nearly $700,000,000 
worth passing out of the coal producing 
countries of the world. 

Q. — Do we really waste our coal? 

A. — One of the bulletins of the United 
States National Museum says that the 
waste that blackens the skies over the 
American cities using soft coal is in real- 
ity convertible into gas, tar, ammonia, 
benzol, and an endless number of other 
by-products, such as dyes, medicines, and 
explosives. 

Q. — How much of our coal do we 
waste? 

A. — The Government bulletin on "Coal 
Products" says : 

"Almost one-seventh of our coal is made 
into coke, so great are the demands of 
the iron industry, but two-thirds of this 
coke is produced without regard to saving 
the valuable products driven off during its 
manufacture. Therefore, we face the 
alarming conclusion that only about 4 per 
cent of the coal mined in the United 
States yields its full value to society." 

Q. — How much coal does France 
ordinarily consume? 

A. — The annual production was about 
40,000,000 tons, and the amount imported 
about 8,ooo,odo tons. The total consump- 
tion thus would appear to have been 
nearly 50,000,000 tons a year. More than 
60 per cent of the coal mined in France 
came from the Flemish coal basin, the 
whole of which is now in enemy hands. 

Q. — Does Spain produce all the 
coal she wants? 

A. — Not enough has been mined ordi- 
narily to provide all the quantity needed. 
Ordinarily about 5,000,000 tons were pro- 
duced, but 7,000,000 tons were required. 
An agreement was arrived at by which 
the miners undertook to work two hours 
extra every day, a special premium being 
given them. This arrangement has in- 
creased the output to more than 7,000,000 
tons. 

Q. — What is the amount of Chilean 

coal imports? 

A. — The Chileans have to import coal 
as their own mines do not yield nearly 



enough for their industrial requirements. 
Before the war they were importing some 
$10,000,000 worth. The imports from 
Great Britain were greater than from 
any other country. Next came Germany 
— almost equal — and then the United 
States, a good way behind. 

Q- — What is the annual production 
of copper in the world? 

A. — In the year before the war it was 
about 800,000 tons, Australia's contribu- 
tion being about 40,000 tons. America 
since then has greatly increased her out- 
put, which, in 1916, was said to have 
exceeded 1,000,000 tons. 

Q. — What were American copper 
exports in 191 7? 

A. — In 1917 copper exports aggregated 
i>o83,575,36o pounds (more than half 
a_ million tons) and they had been run- 
ning at the rate of more than 2,240,000 
pounds per day during February, 1918. 

Q. — How much copper did we re- 
fine? 

A. — The country's refineries produced 
in 1917 a total of 2,300,000,000 pounds, an 
increase of 102,600,000 pounds over the 
output of copper in the preceding year. 
When the war began in 1914 the refinery 
capacity of the United States was esti- 
mated at 1,778,000,000 pounds a year. 
Since then additional facilities have been 
created which should enable the refining 
works to produce 2,780,000,000 pounds a 
year. 

Q. — Did we use much more copper 
after we entered the war? 

A. — The consumption of copper in 191 7 
which passed through the refineries of 
the United States is estimated to have 
absorbed all the metal prepared for mar- 
ket in the twelve months and nearly 20,- 
000,000 pounds in addition. That is, the 
stocks of refined copper held over from 
1916, which amounted to about 128,000,000 
pounds at the end of the year, were not 
only not increased during 1917, but were 
reduced to a level in the neighborhood of 
100,000,000 pounds. 

Q. — What is the monthly copper 
production of all America? 

A. — The copper production of the 
Western Hemisphere in January, 1918, is 
estimated to have been approximately 
173,000,000 pounds, an increase of 4,000,- 



286 



Questions and Answers 



ooo pounds over the December output. If 
this extreme rate of production could be 
maintained the year around (which is 
highly improbable) the total output of 
copper for this hemisphere alone would 
be more than a million tons in the year. 

Q. — Is much copper found in 
Chile? 

A. — At one time Chile was the greatest 
producer of copper in the world, but her 
mines have been neglected. The great 
war demand for copper has, _ however, 
caused much activity, and Americans have 
invested largely. 

Q. — Whence does Great Britain get 
most of her copper? 

A. — From the United States, mostly in 
the form of unwrought copper. Of the 
total British import in 1914 of 147,700 
tons, 94,800 was from the United States. 

Q. — Could the Allies get enough 
gasoline in their own hemi- 
sphere? 

A. — The need of the Allied nations in 
Europe for American gasoline was dis- 
played in the January, 1918, figures of 
exports, reported by the Bureau of Com- 
merce. The amount of gasoline, naph- 
thas and other light refined oil products 
shipped abroad was 41,686,142 gallons, 
compared with 35,335,977 in the same 
month, 1917, and 38,065,244 in January, 
1916. Crude oil, fuel oil and residuum, 
lubricating and illuminating oil exports 
declined substantially in comparison with 
the preceding January. Gasoline for ex- 
port in barrels was advanced 20 points in 
price by the Standard Oil Company of 
New York on February 27 last. The 
price in 1918 was reported at 12.70 cents 
a gallon when shipped in barrels. 

Q. — Does the British Admiralty 
own oil fields in Southern Per- 
sia and Asia Minor? 

A. — Yes. It was to protect this source 
of supply that early in the war a British 
warship appeared in the Persian Gulf, and 
a very strong Indian contingent was 
landed, which speedily took Basra (the 
old Bassorah of Sinbad the Sailor in the 
Arabian Nights Tales), the port from 
which the oil is shipped. 

Q. — From which countries is petro- 
leum drawn? 

A.— Most of it comes from the United 
States, but Mexico's yield is steadily in- 



creasing. During 1915 the recorded pro- 
duction was as follows : — 

Gallons. 

United States 11 ,806,372,368 

Russia 2,879,018,604 

Mexico 1,382,241,336 

Dutch East Indies 520,245,936 

Roumania 505,256,346 

British India 310,800,000 

Galicia 174,673,758 

Q. — How much oil is being ob- 
tained from the Mexican oil- 
fields? 

A. — It seems certain that hardly a start 
has been made toward the actual full 
development of the Mexican oil-fields, 
which are in the Tampico district. Fif- 
teen of the wells now operated there have 
a capacity of 250 million barrels a year. 
When we note that the total yield on oil 
in the United States in 1916 was 307 mil- 
lion barrels, we are led to credit the as- 
sertion that the full capacity of the Tam- 
pico territory probably would equal the 
output of all other oil regions in the world 
combined. 

Q. — Who owns the Tampico oil- 
fields? 

A. — They belong for the greater part to 
four great companies, although there are 
about 275 smaller operators. The big 
companies are : the Mexican Petroleum, 
controlling 700,000 acres, incorporated in 
California; the Aguila, holding 700,000 
acres close to the coast, a British cor- 
poration, controlled by Lord Cowdray : 
the Royal Dutch Shell Trading and 
Transport Company, holding 1,000,000 
acres in two blocks, in which Queen Wil- 
helmina and the Royal Family of Holland 
are interested, as are the Rothschilds ; 
the Penn Mex Oil Company, owning 
600,000 acres just south of Tampico, a 
Standard Oil concern. 

Q. — Does Great Britain depend 
greatly on imports for raw ma- 
terial ? 

A. — She depends almost entirely upon 
them for everything except coal and iron. 
She produces about 5,000,000 tons of iron 
from her own ore, and about 4,500,000 
from foreign ores ; in addition, in ordi- 
nary times, she imported about 5,000,000 
tons of iron and steel from abroad. She 
has to import all the copper she needs, 
and practically all the tin and lead. No 
cotton is grown in England, or rubber. 
Silk must all come from overseas, and 



The World's Raw Materials 



287 



almost all the petroleum, too, must cross 
the water. Much wool is produced, but 
far more has to be imported, and there is, 
in ordinary times, very little timber hewn 
in the United Kingdom. Leather, in the 
form of hides and skins, comes from 
abroad, and immense quantities of oil- 
seeds, fats, gums, and the like, have to be 
imported. The value of the raw material 
brought into the country in 1913 was 
£281,000,000 ($1,400,000,000). In all, some 
£668,000,000 worth of foodstuffs and raw 
and semi-manufactured material went into 
the United Kingdom in 1913. 

Q. — How many paper mills are 
there in Great Britain? 

A. — In ordinary times there were 270 
mills usually engaged in making paper. 
Many of these must have closed down 
owing to the shortage of supplies. 

Q. — Does Great Britain ordinarily 
draw most of her wood pulp 
from Sweden? 

A. — Roughly half. The rest comes 
from Norway and Canada. Lord North- 
cliffe owns large forests in Newfound- 
land, and has an up-to-date pulping plant 
not far from St. Johns. He turns the 
pulp into paper in his mills in England, 
however. By no means all the paper pro- 
duced in Great Britain is made from 
wood pulp. Much of it is produced from 
esparte grass, huge quantities of which 
come from Algeria in ordinary times. 

Q. — Has the English prohibition 
of wood pulp severely hit the 
Swedes? 

A. — It must have done so. Before the 
war some 30,000 workers were employed 
in the wood-pulp mills, and since the 
struggle began the production of pulp 
should have increased materially, as the 
German supplies were no longer available 
for the world's markets. 

Q. — How much wood pulp does 
Great Britain usually import 
from Sweden? 

A.— About £1,500,000 ($7,500,000) worth 
annually. 

Q. — Is wood pulp the principal 
material exported to Great 
Britain from Sweden? 

A. — No. It comes sixth on the list. 
The main thing exported is timber. More 
than $50,000,000 worth is exported annu- 
ally, $15,000,000 worth going to Great 
Britain. The other notable purchase from 



Sweden is butter. Nearly $10,000,000 
worth is sent across the North Sea for 
British consumption. 

Q. — What are the chief occupa- 
tions of the English people? 

A. — According to the census of 1901 the 
metal industries and agriculture each 
employed about the same number of 
people, viz: agriculture, 1,192,167; metal 
industries of every sort, 1,116,202. Tex- 
tile manufactures gave occupation to 
994,668,_ and of these 529,131 were em- 
ployed in the cotton industries. Boots and 
shoes occupied 229,257. In the pottery and 
glass manufactures were 90,000. In min- 
ing there were 805,185. 

Q. — Are English industries much 
localized? 

A— Yes. This is due to geographical 
conditions, and also to the distribution of 
raw materials. Thus the great china and 
pottery industries, though not absolutely 
limited to those districts, are largely sit- 
uated in Staffordshire, where the city of 
Stoke and many of the contiguous towns 
actually bear the name of "The Potteries." 
The cotton industry belongs largely to 
South Lancashire, where Manchester and 
its great neighboring towns are the world- 
famed centers of industry. The industry 
has also expanded widely into adjacent 
parts of Cheshire, the West Riding of 
Yorkshire and Derbyshire. {Encyclopaedia 
Britannica). Coal deposits have been im- 
portant factors in thus localizing the cot- 
ton industry, but the moist climate also 
has been a deciding element, as it is of 
great benefit for the work. 

Q. — Where are England's metal 
working districts mainly? 

A. — Chiefly near the coal and metal de- 
posits of the island kingdom. Thus the 
Cleveland, Durham, and Furness districts 
have attracted many. The most famous 
locality, however, is the "Black Country," 
and Birmingham district of Staffordshire, 
Warwickshire and Worcester. Large 
amounts of iron and steel, however, are 
produced in the huge manufacturing areas 
of Lancashire and the West Riding of 
Yorkshire, where certain centers are 
noted, such as Sheffield for its cutlery. 
The London district has very large engi- 
neering interests, and Birmingham and 
Coventry _ are famed for their motor- 
building industries. 

Q. — How much cotton does Egypt 
produce? 

A.— The Nile yield is about 800,000,000 
pounds. In a good year the crops might 



288 



Questions and Answers 



possibly be increased by about 10 per 
cent, but this is the utmost that can be 
expected with the area under cultivation. 
It is said that the production could be 
increased by about ioo per cent if all pos- 
sible irrigation works are executed in 
Egypt and in the Upper Nile region, but 
that result could not be attained for an- 
other 25 or 30 years. When it had been 
attained, however, the agricultural re- 
sources of the country would have been 
developed to their fullest extent, and the 
limit of yield would have been reached. 

Q. — Does Australia lead the world 
in wool production? 

A. — Yes. There are indications, how- 
ever, that eventually the combined produc- 



tion of Argentine and Uruguay will be 
greater than hers. Uruguay is a territory 
where the merino flourishes as well as in 
Australia. There are said to be about 
21,000,000 merinos in all in that country. 
There also are many in South Africa, 
but the South African wool is said not to 
be quite as good as Australian, though 
some of it brings almost as much in the 
English markets. Taking the production 
of 1912, we find that Australasia was re- 
sponsible for 840,000,000 pounds of the 
world's wool clip. Argentina for 415,000,- 
000 pounds, Russia for 380,000,000 pounds, 
the United States for 322,000,000 pounds, 
the United Kingdom for 145,000,000 
pounds, Uruguay for 130,000,000, and 
South Africa for 112,000,000. In 1904 
the wool clip in Argentina was only 
330,000,000 pounds. 



AMERICAN CONDUCT OF WAR 



Q. — What was the first war tax on 
excess profits? 

A,— Under the act of October 3, 1Q}7, 
a tax was levied on the net incomes of in- 
dividuals, partnerships, or corporations 
which (after certain permitted deduc- 
tions) were in excess of certain percent- 
ages of the invested capital of such indi- 
viduals, etc. The rates were as follows : 
20 per cent of profits not in excess of 15 
per cent of the invested capital ; 25 per 
cent of profits, 15 per cent and not in ex- 
cess of 20 per cent of invested capital ; 35 
per cent of profits, 20 per cent and not 
in excess of 25 per cent of invested cap- 
ital ; 45 per cent of profits, 25 per cent 
and not in excess of 33 per cent of in- 
vested capital ; 60 per cent of profits, 33 
per cent and better of invested capital. 
In addition, in the case of a trade or 
business (a term which includes the pro- 
fessions as well) having no invested cap- 
ital or only a nominal capital, a tax of 
8 per cent was levied on all net incomes, 
of individuals, above $6,000, or of cor- 
porations, above $3,000. Finally the tax 
of 12^ per cent which was levied by the 
act of September 8, 1916, on the net in- 
comes of all persons, corporations, etc., 
manufacturing munitions, electric motor 
boats, submarines, etc., was reduced after 
January 1, to 10 per cent. 

Q. — What was the first war tax on 
incomes? 

A. — Under the act of October 3, 1917, 
new income taxes were imposed. The 
preceding law taxed the net incomes of 
individuals in excess of $3,000 for an un- 
married man and $4,000 for a head of a 
family. The war tax bill reduced the 
exemption of unmarried persons to 
$1,000 and of heads of families to $2,000, 
but granted an additional exemption of 
$200 for each dependent child. The sur- 
taxes on incomes of $5,000 and over were 
the same for all, as follows : Between 
$5,000 and $7,500, 1 per cent; $7,500 and 
$10,000, 2 per cent ; $10,000 and $12,500, 
3 per cent; $12,500 and $15,000, 4 per 
cent; $15,000 and $20,000, 5 per cent; 
$20,000 and $40,000, 8 per cent ; $40,000 
and $60,000, 12 per cent; $60,000 and 
$80,000, 17 per cent; $80,000 and $100,000, 
22 per cent; $100,000 and $150,000, 27 
per cent; $150,000 and $300,000, 42 per 
cent; $300,000 and $500,000, 46 per cent; 
$500,000 and $750,000, 50 per cent; $750,- 



289 



000 and $1,000,000, 55 per cent; $1,000,000 
and $1,500,000, 61 per cent; $1,500,000 
and $2,000,000, 62 per cent ; over $2,000,- 
000, 63 per cent. 

Q. — What was the Trading with 
the Enemy Act? 

A.— The Trading with the Enemy Act 
provided that a person who is "an enemy" 
or ally of enemy "doing business within 
the United States" may apply for a license 
to continue to do business in the United 
States. This act prohibited and imposed 
severe penalties on communicating with 
the enemy, but licenses could be granted 
for relief from the various "communica- 
tions." 

Q. — Who is officially an enemy of 
the United States? 

A— (a) An enemy, according to the 
Trading with the Enemy Act, is "Any 
individual, partnership, or other body of 
individuals of any nationality, resident 
within the territory (including that occu- 
pied by the military and naval forces) of 
any nation with which the United States 
is at war, or resident outside the United 
States and doing business within such 
territory, and any corporation incorpo- 
rated within such territory of any nation 
with which the United States is at war 
or incorporated within any country other 
than the United States and doing business 
within such territory. 

(b) The government of any nation with 
which the United States is at war, or any 
political or municipal subdivision thereof, 
or any officer, official, agent, or agency 
thereof. 

(c) Such other individuals, or body of 
class of individuals, as may be natives, 
citizens, or subjects of any nation with 
which the United States is at war, other 
than citizens of the United States, wher- 
ever resident, or wherever doing business 
as the President, if he shall find the safety 
of the United States or the successful 
prosecution of the war shall so require, 
may, by proclamation, include within the 
term "enemy." 

Q. — What is a person holding 
property of an enemy expected 
to do? 

A.— Any person in the United States 
who holds or has custody or control oT 



290 



Questions and Answers 



any property himself or in behalf of an 
enemy or an ally of an enemy is ex- 
pected to report the fact to the Alien 
Property Custodian by written statement 
under oath, containing such particulars as 
such custodian may require. 

Q. — Is a citizen of the United 
States bound by a contract 
with a citizen of one of the 
Central Powers? 

A. — Any contract entered into prior to 
the beginning of the war, between any 
citizen of the United States and any 
citizen of the Central Powers, the terms 
of which provide for delivery during or 
after the war, may be abrogated by serv- 
ing a thirty days' notice in writing, upon 
the Alien Property Custodian of his dis- 
trict. 

Q. — What happens to money be- 
longing to enemies of the 
United States seized under the 
Enemy Alien Act? 

A. — All money paid to the Alien Prop- 
erty Custodian belonging to the enemy is 
deposited in the Treasury of the United 
States and invested by the Secretary of 
the Treasury in United States bonds. At 
the end of the war, any claim of an 
enemy alien or ally of an enemy to any 
money or other property received or held 
by the Alien Property Custodian or de- 
posited in the United States Treasury 
shall be settled as Congress directs. The 
President and the officials whom he ap- 
points to assist him in administering the 
Trading with the Enemy Act have very 
broad authority to seize all property of 
whatever kind and hold it during the 
period of the war. 

Q. — What was President Wilson's 
Cabinet when war began? 

A. — Secretary of State, Robert Lan- 
sing; Secretary of the Treasury, William 
Gibbs McAdoo; Secretary of War, New- 
ton Diehl Baker; Attorney General, 
Thomas Watt Gregory; Secretary of the 
Navy, Josephus Daniels ; Secretary of the 
Interior, Franklin Knight Lane; Secre- 
tary of Agriculture, David Franklin 
Houston ; Secretary of Commerce, Wil- 
liam Cox Redfield ; Secretary of Labor, 
William Bauchop Wilson. 

Q. — Were women called in by the 
American government to help ? 

A. — A group of 10 representative 
women of the United States was ap- 



pointed by the Council of National De- 
fense, April 21, 1917, to coordinate and 
centralize the war work of women. The 
members are Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, of 
New York, chairman ; Miss Ida Tarbell, 
of New York, vice-chairman ; Mrs. Philip 
N. Moore, of St. Louis, secretary; Mrs. 
Stanley McCormick, of Boston, treas- 
urer; Mrs. Josiah E. Cowles, of Cali- 
fornia ; Miss Maud Wetmore, of Rhode 
Island ; Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, of 
New York; Mrs. Antoinette Funk, of 
Illinois ; Mrs. Joseph R. Lamar, of 
Georgia ; and Miss Agnes Nestor, _ of 
Illinois. The organization has State divi- 
sions in 48 States, and acts as a mouth- 
piece of the Government, sending mes- 
sages to women, stimulating patriotic 
service, and supplying a channel for ef- 
fective prosecution of war work. There 
are 10 departments or _ sub-committees 
finding their counterpart in State, county, 
and civic units, namely, registration, food 
production and home economics, food 
administration, women in industry, child 
welfare, maintenance of existing social 
service agencies, health and recreation, 
education, Liberty Loan, and home and 
foreign relief. Headquarters at 1814 N 
Street NW, Washington, D. C, is clear- 
ing house for war activities through 
organizations and through individ- 
uals. 



Q. — Did Congress assume any part 
in the question of peace terms ? 

A. — Congress, by common consent, and 
with the undoubted approval of the na- 
tion, avoided discussion for a considerable 
period after the Declaration of War, and 
left the matter entirely in the hands of 
the President. 

In the session of Congress which passed 
the Declaration of War, a few sporadic 
attempts were made to begin discussion 
but they went no further than isolated 
speeches and resolutions, which were 
tabled. 

The next session of Congress also re- 
frained from any discussion until after 
the famous Message by President Wilson 
outlining peace terms and war aims. On 
January 31, 1918, Senators Borah of Idaho 
and Owen of Oklahoma each offered 
resolutions covering the subject. The 
resolutions were supported by speeches, 
and were referred to the Committee on 
Foreign Affairs. 

These may be held to have been the 
first actual and really important steps by 
Congress to reassume its share of 
activity. 



American Conduct of War 



291 



Q. — What was our reply to the 
Peace Appeal of the Pope in 
August, 1917? 

A. — President Wilson's answer pointed 
out that the plan proposed would mean 
a recuperation of Germany's strength, 
and that much as we desired a just peace 
we could not take the word of her rulen 
as a guarantee of anything durable. 

He went on : "The purposes of the 
United States in this war are known to 
the whole world, to every people to whom 
the truth has been permitted to come. 
They do not need to be stated again. We 
seek no material advantage of any kind. 
We believe that the intolerable wrongs 
done in this war by the brutal and furious 
power of the Imperial Government ought 
to be repaired, but not at the expense of 
the sovereignty of any people — rather a 
vindiction of the sovereignty both of 
those that are weak and of those that are 
strong. Punitive damages, the dismem- 
berment of empires, the establishment of 
selfish and exclusive economic leagues, 
we deem inexpedient and in the end worse 
than futile, no proper basis for a peace of 
any kind, least of all for an enduring 
peace. That must be based upon justice 
and fairness and the common rights ot 
mankind." 

Q. — What is the Monroe Doctrine? 

A. — Washington recommended that the 
United States should avoid entangling 
itself in the politics of Europe. That 
policy has been consistently followed, 
and in our own time was reaffirmed for- 
mally when the United States delegates 
signed The Hague Conventions with the 
proviso that nothing contained therein 
should be so construed as "to require the 
United States to depart from its tradi- 
tional policy of not intruding upon, inter- 
fering with, or entangling itself in, 
the political questions, or policy, or inter- 
nal administration of any foreign State, 
nor shall anything contained in the said 
Conventions be construed to imply a re- 
linquishment by the United States of its 
traditional attitude towards purely Amer- 
ican questions." This "traditional atti- 
tude" is the second great American prin- 
ciple, ranking next after Washington's 
policy. It is known as the Monroe Doc- 
trine because it was officially and fully 
declared for the first time by President 
Monroe in 1823. At that time it was 
feared in America that the combination 
of European Powers known as the Holy 
Alliance meant to interfere in South 
America to restore the Spanish colonies 
to Spain, these having asserted their in- 
dependence. The Monroe Doctrine de- 



clared that there must be no intervention 
by foreign powers in the political affairs 
of independent American States, and also 
warned off European Powers desirous of 
founding colonies on the American con- 
tinents. Originally aimed to prevent the 
overthrow of independent republics, the 
Doctrine has become a permanent part 
of the foreign policy of the United States, 
and has come to be regarded as a sort of 
general protectorate over the whole of 
the New World. In brief, it means that 
the United States will not tolerate any 
European interference whatever in any 
part of the American continent. 

Q. — What was the famous Senate 
bill for creating a War cabi- 
net? 

A. — It was a bill made public by the 
Senate Committee on Military Affairs 
establishing a War Cabinet to be com- 
posed of "three distinguished citizens of 
demonstrated ability," to be appointed by 
the President, with the advice and con- 
sent of the Senate. Its powers were to be 
very great, both as to advice, investiga- 
tion, and control. 

Q. — What was the attitude of the 
President regarding the war 
cabinet proposal? 

A. — He objected unqualifiedly and 
sharply. He declared his objection to any 
form of interference with the executive 
conduct of the war. 

Q. — When did Secretary Baker 
make his famous statement be- 
fore the Senate? 

A. — He made this statement before the 
Senate Committee on Military Affairs 
on January 28, 1918. It followed charges 
made by Senator Chamberlain that the 
war department had failed to do all that 
it should have done. The Secretary of 
War had appeared some time before to 
testify before the Committee, and his 
statements then had lacked circumstantial- 
ity and fullness. The statement of Jan- 
uary 28 was one of the most elaborate 
ever made by an officer of government in 
this country, and it gave the nation a 
most vivid and clear picture of the mag- 
nitude of the problem confronting the 
government and people, and of the vast 
undertakings and efforts that were nec- 
essary to conduct the war. 

Q. — What was the gist of the sec- 
retary's statement? 

A. — That while errors had been made, 
and shortcomings existed, the work of 



292 



Questions and Answers 



the War Department as a whole had been 
extraordinarily good and successful. 

Q. — When was the post of Sur- 
veyor-General of Army Pur- 
chases created, and why? 

A. — Secretary Baker announced this 
appointment on January 25 after Senator 
Chamberlain's public criticisms. The 
officer thus created was appointed to be 
in charge of the procurement and pro- 
duction of all supplies by the five army 
bureaus, viz., Ordnance, Quartermaster, 
Signal, Engineer, and Medical. It was to 
be his duty to co-ordinate such pur- 
chases and properly relate the same to 
industry to the end that the army pro- 
gram be developed under a comprehen- 
sive plan which should best utilize the 
resources of the country. 

Q. — Was an army officer ap- 
pointed to the new post of Sur- 
veyor-General ? 

A. — A civilian was appointed — Edward 
R. Stettinius, who had been in practical 
charge of purchases for the Allies during 
the war while the United States was 
neutral. He was a member of the firm 
of J. P. Morgan and Company, having 
entered it about two years before. He 
was born in St. Louis in 1865, was grad- 
uated from the St. Louis University, and 
entered business in 1883. From 1906 to 
1915 he was president of the Diamond 
Match Company. 

Q. — What new American govern- 
mental agencies were created? 

A. — Leading agencies were : shipping 
board, food administration, fuel adminis- 
tration, war industries board, raw ma- 
terials board, aircraft production board, 
Allies' purchasing board, war trade board 
and a director-general of railroads. 
There was also a board controlling prior- 
ity of freight shipments. 

Q. — What acts, not financial, were 
passed to authorize war meas- 
ures? 

A. — Following the declaration of war 
(April 6, 1917), Congress passed, first, 
an act granting the President authority to 
take over enemy merchant vessels in 
American ports. On May 18 there was 
passed the Selective Draft Act, authoriz- 
ing the drafting of American citizens into 
a great National Army, and also bringing 
the Regular Army to full war strength, 



besides placing the various National 
Guards (armed militia) of the States into 
the Federal service. 

Q. — Did other acts confer further 
authority on the President? 

A. — An act, called the "espionage act," 
gave the Federal Government immensely 
large powers over the people, and inci- 
dentally authorized the President to lay 
embargoes on exports at his discretion, an 
authorization that gave the Government 
enormous powers of control over the na- 
tion's and the world's commerce. Then 
followed a food and fuel bill for exer- 
cising control over those great economic 
necessities. There were also the act reg- 
ulating trade with the enemy and the law 
for insuring men in the military and 
naval service of the country. 

Q. — What was the early effect of 
government operation of the 
railroads? 

A. — After a month of government op- 
eration the figures showed that there had 
been a decided reduction in accumulations 
of export freight at the seaports, caused 
by the increased fuelling of ships and by 
the embargoes placed on certain kinds of 
shipment. 

More than 4,000 freight cars thus were 
emptied and released for further use. 
The Regional Director of Railroads re- 
ceived the following detailed report 
showing the car situation at six North 
Atlantic ports on January 1, 1918, when 
the government took the roads out of 
private control, and on February 1, after 
a month of government control: 

Ports. Jan. I. Feb. 1. Dec. P. C. 

Boston 1,190 998 192 16.14 

New York 24,971.19,723 5,248 24.02 

Philadelphia .. 3,531 3,307 224 6.34 

Baltimore 7,164 5,878 1,286 17.95 

Newport News. 1,653 1,284 369 22.32 

Norfolk 2,592 2,403 189 7.29 



All ports ...41,101 33,593 7,5o8 18.27 

Q. — What is the Council of Na- 
tional Defense? 

A. — It was established by Congress in 
1916, and consists of: Secretary of War, 
Newton D. Baker, chairman ; Secretary 
of the Navy, Josephus Daniels ; Secretary 
of the Interior, Franklin K. Lane ; Sec- 
retary of Agriculture, David F. Houston ; 
Secretary of Commerce, William C. Red- 
field; Secretary of Labor, William B. 
Wilson. 



American Conduct of War 



293 



Its function as specified in the act of 
Congress creating it is stated as the 
"creation of relations which will render 
possible in time of need the immediate 
concentration and utilization of the re- 
sources of the nation." 

Q. — Was there any addition to it? 

A. — Yes. The act establishing it pro- 
vided for an Advisory Commission to be 
nominated by the council and appointed 
by the President and for such subordinate 
bodies as the council saw fit to organize 
"for its assistance in special investiga- 
tions." The members of the Advisory 
Commission were originally: 

Daniel Willard, chairman, Transporta- 
tion and Communication ; 

Howard E. Coffin, Munitions and Manu- 
facturing (including standardization) and 
Industrial Relations ; 

Julius Rosenwald, Supplies (including 
clothing), etc.; 

Bernard M. Baruch, Raw Materials, 
Minerals, and Metals ; 

Dr. Hollis Godfrey, Engineering and 
Education ; 

Samuel Gompers, Labor, including con- 
servation of health and welfare of work- 
ers; 

Dr. Franklin Martin, Medicine and 
Surgery, including general sanitation. 

Much of the advisory committee's work 
has been absorbed by other newer bodies 
such as the War Industries Board, etc. 

Q. — Who purchases supplies for 
the United States Navy? 

A. — The Bureau of Supplies and Ac- 
counts purchases stores and issues all sup- 
plies for the naval establishment. Pay- 
master-General Samuel McGowan is the 
head of this Bureau. 

Q. — Was January, 1918, really the 
coldest month on record? 

A. — It was for a great many regions in 
the United States. It was the coldest 
month on record for such cities as New 
York, for instance, where the daily aver- 
age was 9 degrees below the average for 
38 previous years. 

Q. — Is America rebuilding the 
ruined French towns? 

A. — In the Alsace district the Ameri- 
cans are assisting notably. Noyon has 
been adopted by the city of Washington, 
and is being rebuilt by contributions from 
the people of that city. The American 
fund for French wounded has taken full 



charge of the hamlet of Behericourt, and 
the Comtesse de Chabrannes has under- 
taken to rebuild the hamlet of Maucourt. 
The village of Vitrimont in the Vosges 
region has been rebuilt by Mrs. Crocker, 
of California. The place was a desert 
when she began, but her representative 
found herself at the head of a small army 
of eager villagers, who undertook the 
heaviest tasks of house-building under 
her leadership. Already a church and 
rows of attractive two-story houses have 
risen. Houses, farms, public buildings 
are all erected according to a plan which 
gives them a logical grouping. 

Q. — Did the stock markets rise in 
the early part of 1918 because 
of peace rumors? 

A. — There were many minor causes 
that served to account for advance in 
market quotations, but presumably these 
minor causes would not have been suffi- 
cient in themselves. While it is not safe 
to assert unequivocally that the January 
rise in prices was a reflection of belief 
that peace was prognosticated, it is cer- 
tain that with the beginning of actual 
talk about a possible settlement of the 
great war, a quiet, steady, slow advance 
began in prices, and that it continued 
daily with very few fluctuations. 

Q. — Why is America nicknamed 
Uncle Sam? 

A. — After the declaration of war with 
England in 1812, Elbert Anderson of New 
York, a contractor, visited Troy, where 
he purchased a large quantity of provi- 
sions. The government inspectors at 
that place were Ebenezer and Samuel 
Wilson. The latter was universally 
known as "Uncle Sam" and the articles 
passed by him were marked "E. A. — 
U. S." A humorous fellow, being asked 
the meaning of the initials, said he did 
not know, unless it meant "Elbert Ander- 
son and Uncle Sam," alluding to "Uncle 
Sam" Wilson. The joke became a stock 
topic and thus "Uncle Sam" was finally 
adopted as a nickname. It is, accurately 
speaking, a nickname for the United 
States Government, not for the nation. 

Q. — Does America intern alien ene- 
mies? 

A. — America has adopted a magnani- 
mous and tolerant attitude toward the 
subjects of hostile States who are now 
in this country. A Presidential proclama- 
tion issued April 6, 1917, assured them 



294 



Questions and Answers 



that as long as they refrain from acts of 
hostility they would be left undisturbed. 

This attitude has been maintained. 
During the months following the declara- 
tion of war, alien enemies (or, to speak 
more accurately, enemy aliens) were pro- 
hibited from entering certain districts, 
such as water-fronts, camps, etc. A num- 
ber, guilty of inimical acts or suspected 
as being potentially dangerous, were in- 
terned. In February, 1918, there began 
a general registration of enemy aliens, 
with finger-print records, etc. 

Q. — Has America the right to in- 
tern all enemy aliens, even if 
they behave themselves? 

A. — Yes. Every country engaged in 
war has the right to imprison all sub- 
jects of the hostile country, if it chooses 
to do so. They may even be put to work 
under conditions prescribed by The Hague 
Conventions. The treatment of enemy 
aliens in any belligerent country is simply 
a matter of policy. 

Q. — Is it permitted for a belligerent 
to purchase weapons of war 
from neutrals without let or 
hindrance ? 

A. — The laws of neutrality permit this 
to be done without any interference on 
the part of neutral Governments. French 
agents bought revolvers, etc., in Great 
Britain during the Franco-German war, 
and the British Government answered the 
German protests with the statement that 
no purely mercantile transactions could 
be considered a violation of neutrality. 
The Allies purchased huge quantities of 
war material from the United States,_ and 
in reply to Austria's protests President 
Wilson took the same point of view as did 
the British Government during the 
Franco-Prussian war. 

Q. — Is German taught in all the 
public schools throughout the 
United States? 

A. — According to statistics compiled 
late in 1917 by the Bureau of Education 
of the Department of the Interior, after 
inquiries had been sent to the superin- 
tendents of many of the elementary 
schools in the United States, there are 
only nineteen cities out of 163 of 25,000 



population or over reporting to the De- 
partment of Education that teach foreign 
languages below the seventh grade. 

Q. — What proportion does German 
bear in relation to other foreign 
languages ? 

A. — In twelve of these cities German 
is the foreign language taught. In three 
cities German, French, and Spanish are 
all taught in the elementary grades. In 
one city German, Italian, and Polish, 
while in the three remaining cities the 
languages taught to the elementary 
school children are French and Spanish, 
alone or in combination. In a few cities 
the foreign language is taught in all 
grades, from the first to the eighth ; in 
others the instruction does not begin until 
the fifth or sixth grade. The number of 
elementary school children taking German 
ranges from 40 in one city to 22,000 in 
another. 

Q. — What is Pan- Americanism ? 

A. — For a long time there has been 
manifested a stronger and stronger feel- 
ing that the American republics consti- 
tute a group which is more closely bound 
together than other nations of the world, 
because of their common ideals and com- 
mon aspirations — a feeling which has un- 
doubtedly been emphasized by their geo- 
graphical isolation from other countries. 
It is the bond of sympathy which draws 
together the twenty-one republics of our 
western world and makes of them the 
American family of nations. 

Q. — Did the Government send 
money to Americans caught in 
the warring countries? 

A. — Yes. The battleship Tennessee 
went in August^ 1914, with $2,500,000 in 
gold for the relief of American citizens 
in Europe. This money was distributed 
through the American legations. 

Q. — Has our Government an au- 
thorized censorship? 

A. — Yes. The Trading with the Enemy 
Bill, passed September 12, 1917, includes 
a provision for censorship of mail and 
telegraphic communications with foreign 
countries. Also, it has an amendment 
requiring German-language newspapers 
to publish an English translation of all 
comment on the war. 



SOME PAST CAMPAIGNS 



Q. — When was the battle of Water- 
loo fought? 

A. — It was fought on Sunday, June 18, 
1815, between Napoleon, with 72,000 men 
(246 guns), and Wellington, with 67,700 
Allies (156 guns). The day was de- 
cided by the arrival of Bliicher with 50,- 
000 Prussians (104 guns). There were 
in all only 24,000 British on the field. 

Q. — Where is Waterloo? 

A. — It is about 10 miles south by east 
from Brussels. Waterloo is a very small 
and unimportant place in itself, with only 
about 3,000 inhabitants. 

Q. — Was there a battle of Water- 
loo in the present war? 

A. — No. It was not a strategic point. 
Napoleon and Wellington fought their 
battle there only because the British army 
had concentrated on Brussels. In the 
present war, no stand was made near 
Brussels and the Germans entered unop- 
posed. 

Q. — What were the losses in the 
battle of Waterloo? 

A. — The British, who only numbered 
24,000, lost 2,000 killed and 5,000 wounded. 
The Allies lost altogether, including 
these, 4,200 killed, 14,500 wounded, and 
4,230 missing. The French loss was more 
than 40,000 killed, wounded and prison- 
ers, but accurate details have never been 
obtained. 

Q. — How old was Napoleon at 
Waterloo? 

A. — He was only 46. Wellington was 
the same age ; so were Ney and Soult. 
Crouchy was 40, Murat 44. Nelson died 
at 47. All these men had achieved their 
greatest fame before they reached 40. 
Alexander the Great died when he was 
33. Hannibal was 30 when he crossed 
the Alps. Sir Francis Drake, with a great 
career behind him, was 48 when he met 
the Armada. 

Q —Who said that "God is on the 
side of the biggest battalions"? 

A. — Napoleon. It was he also who said 
that an army "marched on its belly." 
Nowadays he would, no doubt, slightly 
alter both these trite remarks, and, in- 
stead, would say that "God is on the side 



of the biggest factories," and that an army 
"marches on petrol." 

Q. — Has war ever produced so 
much hatred as this one? 

A. — It is certainly true that all wars 
nave produced hatred and unfairness to- 
wards enemies. 

But the most judicial minded observer 
cannot fail to notice some essential dif- 
ferences in this world struggle. In no 
previous war have great neutral nations, 
thousands of miles away from the con- 
flict, been forced, one after the other, to 
take up arms because of the indiscrimi- 
nate ruthlessness of one of the combat- 
ants. 

There was certainly no hate of Ger- 
many, for instance, in the United States 
before August, 1914. 

The feeling which animates most of the 
civilized world today against the Teutonic 
Powers, from Siam to Brazil, is the crea- 
tion of their deeds. Slowly, and in many 
cases with extreme reluctance, all the 
other peoples have been forced by Ger- 
many's acts to the conviction that her 
whole theory of development meant the 
destruction of everything that civilization 
most cherishes. 

Q. — Who were the Huns? 

A— They were a people of Tartar or 
Ugrain stock, who, three centuries be- 
fore Christ, appear to have dominated the 
whole of what is now known as Siberia. 
They first appeared west of the Volga in 
374, and proceeded to attack the then all- 
powerful Gothic Empire. They were soon 
supreme between the Danube and the 
Volga, and expanded through into Persia 
and Syria. In 446 the mighty "Scourge 
of God," Attila, began his tremendous 
drive to the west. Civilization collapsed 
before his onslaught, and five years later 
he was outside Paris. There, at the tre- 
mendous battle of Chalons-sur-Marne, the 
combined armies of the Romans, under 
Aetius, and the Visigoths, under Theodo- 
ric, defeated him and saved France. 

Q. — Why are the Germans called 
Huns? 

A. — It is a term of opprobrium, and has 
nothing to do with _ their race, for the 
Germans are of entirely different stock. 
The cruelties and barbarisms of the Huns, 
combined with their great bravery and 
ferocity, gave a terror to their name, 



295 



296 



Questions and Answers 



which has lasted to this day. A few of 
them are said to have settled in northern 
France, and a few in Central Europe. 
They gave their name to Hungary, which 
is, however, now peopled by a different 
race. They were slowly assimilated by 
the peoples around them, or retired across 
the Volga, whence they came. 

Q. — Which are ; regarded as the 
greatest battles of the world? 

A.— According to Creasy, there were 
fifteen "decisive" battles — that is, battles 
which decided the fate of nations and per- 
haps of the world. The early ones were: 
Marathon, where the Greeks defeated the 
tPersians, B.C. 490, and stopped the Asiatic 
invasion. Syracuse, where, B.C. 413, the 
Athenian invaders of Sicily were routed. 
Arbela, where Alexander the Great fi- 
nally crushed the Persians, B.C. 331. Me- 
taurus, where the Romans defeated Has- 
tdrubal, who was hastening to the aid of 
the Carthaginians under Hannibal, B.C. 
207. (As a military achievement, Han- 
nibal's victory over the Romans _ at Can- 
nae was much greater, but the victory at 
Metaurus was the beginning of the end 
of Carthage.) Teutoburg, where, in A.D. 
9, the German Arminius defeated the 
Roman legions under Varus, and freed 
Germany from the Roman yoke. 

Q. — Was one of the decisive fam- 
ous battles fought in Chalons, 
France? 

A. — Chalons, where the last of the 
Roman generals, Aetius and Theodoric, 
King of the Visigoths, defeated the 
Huns under Attila, "The Scourge of 
God," A.D. 451. After Chalons, the Hun- 
nish invasion ebbed, and Attila's vast em- 
pire crumbled away after his death, two 
years later. Then came another great 
battle in France, the battle of Tours, 
where Charles Martel, Duke of the Aus- 
trasian Franks, defeated the Saracens 
under Abderrahman, in 732, and freed 
France and Europe from Moslem domi- 
nation. After these came Hastings, where 
Norman William defeated Saxon Harold, 
in 1066, and laid the foundations for the 
present British Empire, and Orleans, 
where in 1429 Jeanne d'Arc defeated the 
English and delivered France. 

Q. — What was the greatest sea 
battle? 

A. — The fight with the Spanish Ar- 
mada, which, in 1588, was destroyed by 
the British fleet. Spain's dominion of 



the sea was broken, and after that her 
mighty empire began to crumble. 

Q. — What were the other battles? 

A. — Blenheim, where, in 1704, Marl- 
borough, commanding German, British 
and Dutch troops, defeated the French 
and thus destroyed the vast fabric of 
power built up by Louis XIV. It is in- 
teresting to recall that the Irish Brigade, 
fighting for the French, almost turned de- 
feat into victory. Pultowa, where Peter 
the Great defeated Charles of Sweden in 
1709. This victory marked the entry of 
Russia into history as a European power, 
and with it began the decline of Sweden. 
It also marked the beginning of rivalry 
between Slav and Teuton, one of the 
deeper excuses for the world-devastating 
struggle of our day. Saratoga, where, in 
1777, the Americans, under Gates and 
Arnold, defeated the British under Bur- 
goyne and captured his army. Though 
few men were engaged, the victory was 
immediately important. Valmy, where the 
armies of the French Republic won their 
first victory in 1792. The battle saved 
Paris and the French democracy. Water- 
loo, where, in 1815, the British, Dutch, 
Brunswickers and Belgians, under Wel- 
lington, and the Prussians, under Blucher, 
defeated Napoleon, and completed the 
destruction of the mighty empire he had 
built up. At that time a von Bulow, by 
the way, commanded one of the Prussian 
army corps. 

Q. — How do numbers of ancient 
armies compare with to-day? 

A. — There is no comparison at all. 
Never before in the history of the world 
had armies so been used. The largest 
armies of modern times before this war 
were the American armies of the Civil 
War. When the Civil War ended there 
were 2,000,000 Northerners and 1,000,000 
Southerners under arms. In the Franco- 
Prussian War the Germans had 1,124,000 
soldiers, the French 1,000,000. At Water- 
loo, Napoleon had 72,000 men, Welling- 
ton 67,700, and Blucher 50,000. Napol- 
eon's Grande Armee, which invaded Rus- 
sia, crossed the border 600,000 strong. 
Only 20,000 men returned. In ancient 
times Hannibal invaded Italy with 60,000 
men. Alexander the Great conquered the 
known world with 50,000. Charles Mar- 
tel smashed the Saracens and saved 
France from Mohammedan domination 
with an army of 20,000. The Turks were 
defeated by the brilliant Pole, Pan So- 
bieski, before the gates of Vienna, in 
1683, saving Europe. 



THE RED GROSS AND OTHERS 



Q. — Just what is the Red Cross? 

A. — The American Red Cross is an as- 
sociation of more than 3,600,000 Amer- 
icans, forming local chapters, branches, 
and auxiliaries and governed by a central 
committee in Washington, D. C. Its ac- 
counts are audited by the War Depart- 
ment. Any resident or citizen of the 
United States may become a member by 
sending his address and dues to the 
American Red Cross, Washington, D. C, 
or to the chapter in his neighborhood. It 
is a relief clearing house, permanent, re- 
sponsible, and experienced. It is a semi- 
governmental agency for the collection 
and distribution of money and supplies 
for relief purposes. 

Q. — How much money has the 
Red Cross collected? 

A. — Approximately $250,000,000 had 
been collected to July 1, 1981. 

Q. — How much money was col- 
lected in the 1918 summer 
drive? 

A. — About $175,000,000. 

Q. — How much money was spent? 

A. — Approximately $100,000,000 up to 
July, 1918. 

Q. — Where and how was the 
money spent? 

A. — In broad outlines, money had been 
spent as follows up to the nearest date 
available in September, 1918 — In the 
United States about 30 millions, ap- 
portioned thus: Home Relief, $5,000,000; 
Base Hospitals, $20,000,000 ; miscellan- 
eous, $5,000,000, etc. 

In foreign countries about 80 millions, 
apportioned thus : Italy, $20,000,000 ; 
France, $37,000,000; Belgium, $3,000,000; 
Russia, $800,000; Servia, $1,200,000; 
Miscellaneous, $8,000,000, etc. 

Q.—What did the Home Relief 
Service do? 

A. — In September, 1918, the War Coun- 
cil of the American Red Cross reported 
that more than 300,000 families of Amer- 
ican men in service had been relieved of 
money troubles, legal difficulties, family 



worries or of depressing loneliness by the 
Home Service of the Red Cross. This 
branch had 50,000 men and women serv- 
ing on its 10,000 Home Service commit- 
tees. It had reached into remote com- 
munities where there had never been or- 
ganized social effort before. It had estab- 
lished the closest co-operation in the 
larger centers of population with the or- 
ganized agencies of public welfare. It 
was spreading a doctrine of intelligent 
substantial neighborliness on behalf of the 
fighters' families and backing it with an 
expenditure of over $400,000 a month. 

Q. — Does the Home Service help 
soldiers, too? 

A. — It did wonderful work by keeping 
soldiers in touch with their families and 
saving them from any worry about those 
at home. Twenty or more inquiries about 
the welfare of soldiers' families were 
sent over from the army in France every 
day by cable in September, 191 8, and 100 
more came in the daily mail to national 
headquarters. The soldier could ask no 
service for their families that the Red 
Cross did not try to perform. The effect 
on the men's morale was magnificent. 

Q.— What did the Red Cross do 
for the French civilians? 

A. — The two largest items of expendi- 
ture in the work of the .American Red 
Cross among the civilians up to autumn, 
1918, was for relief work and reconstruc- 
tion of villages in devastated areas and 
the relief of thousands of refugees from 
areas occupied by the German armies, in- 
cluding necessary housing and living con- 
ditions for 11,000 families. These two 
items alone aggregated $5,557,605.75. 

Q. — How many workers were 
there in France in 1918? 

A. — Nearly 3,000 persons represented 
the American Red Cross in France for 
work among soldiers and civilians in 
autumn, 1918. 

Q. — How many Red Cross nurses 
were in service? 

A. — Up to August, 191 8, the American 
Red Cross had sent 13,311 nurses over- 
seas. 



297 



298 



Questions and Anszvers 



Q. — What are Red Cross activ- 
ities? 

A. — The public's money given to the 
Red Cross is being spent in France and 
other countries for the following pur- 
poses : Infirmaries and rest stations for 
the sick; disinfecting rooms and dormi- 
tories for soldiers ; hospital equipment, 
medicines and dressings (nearly 4,000 of 
the 6,000 hospitals in France are receiv- 
ing supplies from the American Red 
Cross); food for sick and needy; ambu- 
lances for the wounded ; motor trucks 
which make the American Red Cross in- 
dependent of the overburdened railways 
in France ; medical research ; building of 
homes and schools for orphans and help- 
less ; relief of destitute families ; to fight 
tuberculosis, the deadliest enemy of the 
civil population of France ; general relief 
work in Belgium, and other purposes. 

Q. — How much money goes for 
expenses? 

A. — Figures in 1917 showed that no ex- 
penses of administration in the United 
States were paid for out of the Red Cross 
War Fund. All administration was more 
than met by membership dues. Thus, 
every dollar contributed for relief went 
to relief. 

Q. — How many national organiza- 
tions were officially recog- 
nized by the Government for 
work among the soldiers? 

A. — Seven — Young Men's Christian As- 
sociation, Young Women's Christian As- 
sociation, National Catholic War Council, 
Jewish Welfare Board, American Library 
Association, War Camp Community Ser- 
vice and Salvation Army. In September, 
1918, President Wilson announced his 
judgment that these seven should engage 
in one united appeal for funds. The 
drive, which was set for November, 1918, 
was for $170,500,000. 

Q. — How was this apportioned? 

A. — Young Men's Christian Association, 
$100,000,000; Young Women's Christian 
Association, $15,000,000; National Cath- 
olic War Council (including the work of 
the Knights of Columbus and special war 
activities for women), $30,000,000; Jew- 
ish Welfare Board, $3,500,000 ; American 
Library Association, $3,500,000; War 
Camp Community Service, $15,000,000; 
Salvation Army, $3,500,000. 



Q. — What is the Young Men's 
Christian Association? 

A. — An international and interdenomi- 
national organization of men for Chris- 
tian fellowship and uplift. It was founded 
in 1844, and has an approximate member- 
ship of 1,500,000. Its National War Work 
Council of 10,000 workers covered every 
camp cantonment, naval and military sta- 
tion and seaport in the United States, and 
wherever American troops were stationed 
abroad. "The Y. M. C. A. follows the 
flag." In addition, the Council maintained 
its activities in practically every Allied 
Army except that of Great Britain. 

Principal war activities : Co-operation 
with military authorities in maintaining 
morale of men (1) by wholesome amuse- 
ments, (2) educational training, elemen- 
tary -to highest branches, (3) broad re- 
ligious program, non-sectarian and non- 
propagandic, alike for Protestant, Cath- 
olic and Jew. 

By September 1, 1918, the War Council 
had raised approximately $55,000,000, and 
about 6,000 men and women were serving 
overseas. 



Q. — What is the Young Women's 
Christian Association? 

A. — An international organization of 
women of all Protestant creeds for moral 
and social uplift and assistance to women 
everywhere — especially working women. 
Its membership is about 1,000,000. The 
organization was founded in 1865. It 
used all its resources to meet the special 
needs of girls and women effected by the 
war. In the United States : Emergency 
housing for women in government work ; 
Hostess Houses near Army and Navy 
camps for women relatives and friends of 
soldiers ; a bureau to train foreign-born 
women for interpreters in camps and re- 
construction work in their native coun- 
tries ; employment registries and War 
Service centers for girls in war indus- 
tries ; a bureau of Social Morality ; work 
agencies in colored communities affected 
by the war. In Europe : Social workers, 
recreation leaders, physical directors, 
hostess houses, cafeterias, and recreation 
centers for American nurses, Signal 
Corps women, etc ; housing and cafeteria 
and club service for French women work- 
ing in munition- factories, etc. 

In September, 1918, about 1,200 work- 
ers, including 93 in France and 25 in 
Russia, were in war centers, camps, etc. 
2,800 more were helping to mobilize the 
woman power of .the nation. About 
$5,000,000 had been raised. 



The Red Cross and Others 



299 



Q. — What are the Knights of 
Columbus ? 

A. — A Catholic fraternal organization 
with 420,000 members in the United 
States, Canada and Mexico. Its build- 
ings here and abroad are open at all times 
to all soldiers and all sailors regardless of 
race, color or creed. Its motto is "Every- 
body Welcome and- Everything Free." In 
September, 191 8, about 1,000 men and 
women were actively engaged in war 
Work. There were 502 secretaries in 
training camps and cantonments in the 
United States and 330 workers in France 
and Italy. At that date 524 -buildings 
were completed in 100 camps and conton- 
ments in the United States. In Europe, 
45 buildings and a special motor service 
for American soldiers were maintained. 
The principal aim was to provide social, 
recreational and educational facilities and 
to assist the spiritual welfare of those 
who desired it. It provided soldiers in 
the actual fighting with tobacco, choco- 
late, soap and other articles not furnished 
by the Government. No charge was made. 
Up to September, 1918, $11,249,529 had 
had been collected. Six principal officers 
of this organization with six other prom- 
inent members of the Catholic Church sit 
as Executive Committee for the National 
Catholic War Council, which consists of 
14 Catholic Archbishops -representing 100 
dioceses, each of which has its own local 
war council under its own bishop. 

Q. — What is the Jewish Welfare 
Board? 

A. — A "Win the War" organization 
helping the Government build up the 
morale of more than one hundred thou- 
sand Jewish men in Army and ; Navy. It 
was created in the spring of 1917 by joint 
action of representatives from some ten 
or twelve national Jewish organizations. 
(1) It sends trained workers to camps, 
contonments, forts and naval stations for 
recreational and spiritual needs of all men 
in uniform. (2) Erects for their welfare, 
buildings in camps with rest and writing 
rooms, libraries with English, Yiddish and 
Hebrew literature, victrolas, pianos, etc. 
(3) Conducts religious services on Fri- 
day evenings, all holidays and special 
occasions with aid of visiting and resident 
rabbis. (4) Personal service, such as 
looking after the welfare of parents and 
relatives, etc. 

It covered about fifty camps in United 
States in September, 1918, and more build- 
ings were continually being authorized. 
Headquarters had been opened in Septem- 
ber, 191 8, in Paris at 41 Boulevard Hauss- 



man. In London, a Hospitality Center 
was opened. More than two hundred 
rabbis, business men, social and laywork- 
ers were at work. The budget called for 
$5,000,000 in September, 191 8. 

Q. — What is the American 
Library Association? 

A. — It was organized in 1876 to pro- 
mote the interests of libraries and im- 
prove library conditions in America. At 
the request of the Training Camp Ac- 
tivities Commission in 1917, it assumed 
the care for all reading matter in camps 
and naval and military stations. The 
work was organized as the Library War 
Service, with Dr. Herbert Putnam, libra- 
rian of the Library of Congress, as Gen- 
eral Director. More than 250 trained 
librarians were in the camps in Septem- 
ber, 191 8. Up -to August 1, 19 1 8, there 
had been spent $i,oi4,076\6i. Over 3,000,- 
000 books had been distributed. 828,000 
books had been shipped overseas, 2,662,550 
gift books placed in service and 540,833 
books, largely technical, had been pur- 
purchased. The most popular books were 
fiction for recreational reading. Tech- 
nical books, military and naval books 
were _ most requested and most largely 
supplied. 

Q.— What is the War Camp Com- 
munity Service? 

A. — An organization of men and women 
in near-camp communities all over the 
United States to provide lodging, can- 
teens, entertainment and amusement for 
soldiers on leave. It ministers to the 
physical needs and morale of soldiers 
when outside of the camps, and assists the 
civilian populations of towns near camps 
to organize hospitality centers for soldiers 
on leave and visiting relatives. The 
budget in September, 1918, called for 
$15,000,000 and there were 539 paid work- 
ers besides thousands of volunteers. 

Q. — What is the Salvation Army? 

A. — An organization of men and women 
of all races, creeds and color, for the 
purpose of Rescue Mission Work among 
the unfortunate everywhere. Founded in 
1865. Membership on September 1, 1918, 
many millions in 63 countries all over the 
earth. It did work just behind the lines, 
ministering -to the fighters by supplying 
food and hot drinks and holding religious 
services. By September 1, 1918, $2,485,- 
000 had been raised, and 1,210 men and 
women were at the fronts. 



WHO'S WHO IN ROYALTY 



Q. — Is Belgium's king the son of 
Leopold ? 

A.— Albert I (born 1875), King of the 
Belgians, came to the throne December 
23, 1909, in succession to his uncle, Leo- 
pold II. Becoming heir apparent at the 
age of 17 by the death of his elder 
brother, he passed through the educational 
steps regularly marked out for Belgian 
royalty — the military school, extensive 
travels, participation as member of the 
Senate in national politics. 

Q. — How long has the Kaiser 
ruled? 

A.— William (Wilhelm) II, King of 
Prussia and German Emperor, has ruled 
since June 18, 1888. William II's grand- 
father, William I, achieved German unity, 
established the German Empire, and 
greatly influenced the ideals of his grand- 
son. William II's mother was the eldest 
daughter of Queen Victoria of England. 
At his accession he declared to the army: 
"So we are bound together — I and the 
army — so we are born for one another, 
and so we shall hold together indissolu- 
bly, whether, as God wills it, we are to 
have peace or storm." After forcing Bis- 
marck's resignation on March 18, 1890, 
William II telegraphed to the Grand Duke 
of Weimar : "To me has fallen the post 
of officer of the watch upon the ship of 
state. We shall keep the old course ; and 
now full steam ahead !" Endowed with 
a restless mind and extraordinary energy, 
he considered himself the final authority 
on art, music, history, and the future of 
Germany. Beyond a question, his concep- 
tion of the latter was that it must some 
day dominate the world commercially, po- 
litically and artistically — and he was to 
dominate Germany. 

Q. — How old is he? 

A. — He was born Jan. 27, 1859, and 
became Emperor June 15, 1888. 

Q. — Are the Hohenzollerns an an- 
cient dynasty? 

A. — Very old, although it was not until 
1701 that one of the family became King 
of Prussia. The castle of Hohenzollern 
is said to have been built early In the 
ninth century, but the first historical men- 
tion of the family was when Burkhard 



and Wezil, counts of Zollern, were killed 
in 1061. A direct descendant of Burk- 
hard became Burgrave of Nuremburg in 
1 192. The division of the House of 
Hohenzollern dates from the sons of this 
Conrad, who divided his lands between 
them. The present Emperor of Germany 
belongs to the younger branch, the King 
of Roumania to the elder. On the whole, 
the Burgraves of Nuremburg were good 
rulers, although they took their full share 
in the turbulent doings of the Middle 
Ages. They appear to have encouraged 
commerce and protected the Jews. Hav- 
ing inherited Brandenburg, Frederic in 
1427 sold his right as Burgrave to the 
town of Nuremburg, and from that time 
the family of Hohenzollern is identical 
with that of Brandenburg, until 1701, 
when the Elector Frederick became King 
of Prussia. 

Q. — Is it true that Emperor Wil- 
liam II. was appointed Admiral 
of the English fleet? 

A. — Yes. On August 5, 1889, he was 
created Admiral of the English fleet by 
Queen Victoria. 

Q. — How many sisters has the Kai- 
ser, and to whom are they mar- 
ried? 

A. — He has four sisters. The two eld- 
est and the youngest are married to Ger- 
man princes. The third, Sophie, is the 
wife of King Constantine of Greece. He 
has only one brother, Prince Heinrich. 
The Kaiser has six sons and one daugh- 
ter, who recently married the Duke of 
Brunswick. 

Q. — When did George V ascend 
the throne? 

A. — George V (born 1865), the present 
King of Great Britain, Ireland, and the 
British lands beyond the seas, came to the 
throne at the death of his father, Ed- 
ward VII, in 1910. 

Q. — What was the family name of 
King George V before he 
changed it to Windsor? 

A. — King George I was a Guelph, and 
as his dynasty still reigns in England King 
George V presumably is held to be a 



300 



Who's Who in Royalty 



301 



Guelph also. The descent, however, came 
through the female line — Queen Victoria 
— whose husband, Prince Albert, was a 
member of the Wettin family, from which 
many of the Royal Houses of Europe 
have sprung. Had he not been of royal 
blood, King George V would be regarded 
therefore as a Wettin, not as a Guelph. 
It is interesting to note that the name 
Guelph was associated more particularly 
with Italy than with Germany, and for 
centuries the feud between this house and 
the Ghibellines raged throughout northern 
Italy. In fact, Guelph is held to be the 
Italianized form of Welf, and Ghibelline 
is the Italian name for Waiblingen. The 
feud is said to have originated in 1140 
in a war between Conrad III, King of 
Germany, and Welf, Count of Bavaria, 
whose soldiers used the battle-cry, "Hie 
Welf." To this the King's men replied 
with the shout of "Hie Waiblingen," one 
of the titles of Conrad, who resided at a 
castle of that name. 

Q. — How did the present Aus- 
trian Emperor succeed to the 
throne ? 

A. — The Archduke Charles Francis 
Joseph became Charles I, Emperor of 
Austria and King of Hungary, on the 
death of his great-uncle, Emperor Francis 
Joseph, on November 21, 1916. He is the 
eldest son of the late Emperor's nephew, 
Otto, the younger brother of the Arch- 
duke Francis Ferdinand, murdered at 
Serajevo on June 28, 1914. Charles I 
married, in 191 1, Princess Zita, of the 
Bourbon House of Parma, and has two 
sons. He received a democratic education 
in the public schools of Vienna, which 
shocked sticklers at etiquette of the 
Viennese Court, but which has secured 
him much popularity with his subjects. 
It is generally believed that, compared 
with the other Hapsburgs, his tendency is 
towards democratic reforms for Austria; 
but the clamoring demands of the divided 
elements in this patchwork Empire go far 
beyond such ideas, and his government, 
for example, has proclaimed the Czecho- 
slovaks as traitors who would receive no 
mercy. 

Q. — Is Roumania's king a Hohen- 
zollern? 

A. — Ferdinand I (born 1865), who be- 
came King of Roumania in succession to 
his uncle Charles I on October 11, 1914, 
is a member of the Catholic branch of the 
German Hohenzollerns. 



Q. — What race is King Peter? 

„ A. — Peter I (born 1844), King of Ser- 
bia since June 15, 1903, is a member of 
the Karageorgevitch family. He ascend- 
ed the throne as the result of a palace 
revolution, in which the rival dynasty, 
the Obrenovich, was exterminated. Ow- 
ing to his feeble health in recent years, 
King Peter has practically abdicated, and 
the Crown Prince Alexander has acted as 
regent. 

Q. — Is Constantine still a king? 

A. — No. He abdicated. Constantine I 
(born 1868) married Sophia, sister of the 
German Emperor, and, partly because of 
her influence, attempted to manipulate 
Greek policy in the interest of Germany. 
On June n, 1917, he was forced to abdi- 
cate by Great Britain, France, and Russia, 
who justified their action on three facts: 
(1) Greece had been created a kingdom 
in 1830 through their intervention ; (2) 
they had placed the present dynasty on 
the throne in 1863 ; (3) they had guaran- 
teed a constitutional government. The 
new King, Alexander, second son of Con- 
stantine, invited M. Venizelos to resume 
office and consented to the reassembling 
of the Parliament, dissolved in 1915. 

Q. — When was the late Czar born? 

A. — Nicholas II was born in 1862. He 
ascended the throne October 20, 1894, and 
married Alexandra, Princess of Hesse, 
the same year. Nicholas inaugurated his 
reign by a rigorous repression of all lib- 
eral movements and then embarked on a 
policy of adventure in the Far East, which 
ended in the war with Japan (1904-5) and 
the defeat of Russia. During the war 
a revolutionary movement manifested it- 
self at home, which, culminating in the 
general strike of October, 1905, forced 
the Czar to grant a constitution. But 
Nicholas distrusted the liberals and gave 
the bureaucracy a free hand in crushing 
liberal movements. At the beginning of 
the European war the Czar proclaimed 
the solidarity of throne and people, there- 
by securing a considerable measure of 
popularity; but, once again, he relied too 
exclusively on the bureaucracy, with dis- 
astrous results, for these reactionaries 
soon lost interest in the war, and the Czar 
was compelled by the revolutionists to ab- 
dicate March 15, 1917. He was put to 
death July 16, 1918. 

Q. — Was Francis Joseph a Haps- 
burg? 

A. — Yes. Francis (Franz) Joseph 
(1830-1916), late Emperor of Austria and 



302 



Questions and Answers 



King of Hungary, came to the throne on 
December 2, 1848, when the polyglot lands 
of the Hapsburg monarchy were on the 
point of dissolution. His task during his 
entire reign was essentially dynastic, the 
holding together of his dominions. Under 
his rule the Austrian Provinces in Italy, 
except Trentino and Trieste, were lost to 
the new Kingdom of Italy (1859-1866) 
and Austrian influence in Germany was 
destroyed by Prussia in the war of 1866. 
Bu« in his task of holding together the 
Austrian dominions proper he secured a 
rdative success. Hungary was pacified by 
the agreement of 1867, which granted 
autonomy in local matters and an equal 
share in the government of the monarchy. 
Opinions differ as to the native ability of 
Francis Joseph, but it would at least ap- 
pear that long study of men had given 
him great fitness in dealing with the pe- 
culiar problems of Austria-Hungary. His 
private life was a pilgrimage of sorrow. 
Hi? wife was murdered by an anarchist, 
his son perished in an obscure affair, and 
lastly his nephew and heir was murdered 
a Serajevo in 1914. 

Q. — Is Bulgaria's ruler King or 
Czar? 

A. — He is a Czar. Ferdinand I (born 
i85i) was the younger son of the Prince 
of Saxe-Coburg, and in 1887 was elected 
by the Bulgarians to be their prince. Dur- 
ing the next years his policy was aimed 
at two things — (1) to promote the well- 
being of Bulgaria, and (2) to create an 
army strong enough to make Bulgaria the 
leading State in the Balkans. In these 
highly unselfish aims he was temporarily 
successful ; in 1912 Bulgaria was a pros- 
perous State, and in the first Balkan war 
the Bulgarian army proved its worth. 

Q. — Where was Queen Alexandra, 
English Queen-mother, born? 

A. — She was born on September 1, 1844, 
in Denmark, being the eldest daughter of 
King Christian IX of Denmark. Her 
brother. Frederick VII, was King of Den- 
mark for six years. The present sov- 
ereign, Christian X, is her nephew. An- 
other brother was King George of Greece. 
Thus ex-King Constantine is her nephew 
and a first cousin of King George of Eng- 
land. 

Q. — What relation is the Emperor 
of Germany to King George? 

A. — Cousin. The Emperor's mother 
was the eldest daughter of Queen Vic- 
toria, and sister of Edward VII. The 



Emperor is, in fact, as much English as 
King George, whose mother was a Danish 
Princess. 

Q. — What blood is the Prince 
Consort of the Queen of Hol- 
land? 

A. — He belongs to the Mecklenburg 
family, being an uncle of the present 
Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. 
The Grand Ducal House of Mecklenberg 
is the only reigning family in western 
Europe of Slavonic origin, and claims to 
be the oldest sovereign house in the west- 
ern world. In their full title the Grand 
Dukes style themselves Princes of the 
Wends. Their genealogical table begins 
with Niklot, who died in 1160, and com- 
prises 25 generations. 

Q. — Is the Queen of Roumania an 
English Princess? 

A. — She is so regarded, being a daugh- 
ter of one of the sons of Queen Victoria, 
Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, who, 
in 1803, became Duke of Saxe-Coburg and 
Gotha in succession to the brother of the 
Prince Consort. Prince Alfred married 
the Grand Duchess Marie Alexandrovna 
of Russia, and had four daughters — the 
present Queen of Rumania being the eld- 
est — and one son, who predeceased him. 
The Duke of Connaught became heir to 
the Dukedom of Saxe-Coburg when 
Prince Alfred died, but he and his son 
renounced the succession. It then passed 
to the son of the late Duke of Albany, 
Queen Victoria's youngest son. This son, 
a grandson of Queen Victoria, and brother 
of Princess Alexander of Teck, and 
therefore the brother-in-law of Queen 
Mary, was recently deprived of his Eng- 
lish titles by King George, on the ground 
that he was a German Prince. The 
Queen of Roumania is his cousin. Other 
first cousins of her are King George, the 
Queen of Spain, the Queen of Norway, 
the Crown Princess of Sweden, Prince 
Arthur of Connaught, the Kaiser, the ex- 
Queen of Greece, Prince Henry of Prus- 
sia and Princess Henry, the ex-Czarina, 
Princess Louise of Battenberg, and 
Prince Albert of Schleswig-Holstein. 

Q. — Is the wife of the ex-Czar 
Nicholas a German princess by 
birth? 

A. — She is almost always spoken of 
as a pure German, but though she was 
born in Hesse, her mother was Princess 
Alice of England, the favorite daughter 
of Queen Victoria, sister of Edward VII, 



Who's Who in Royalty 



303 



an aunt of King George V. Her sister 
married Prince Louis of Battenburg, who 
was First Sea Lord when the war broke 
out. Her father was Grand Duke Ludwig 
of Hesse. 

Q. — Is it true that the Kaiser, by 
virtue of his English mother, 
has a claim to the British 
throne? 

A. — Certainly not. Although women 
may sit on the throne of England, the 
male members of the family inherit first. 
Consequently, although the Kaiser's 
mother was the eldest child of Queen 
Victoria, she could have come to the 
throne only if her brothers, King Ed- 
ward VII, the Duke of Edinburgh, and 
the Duke of Connaught had died. Had 
they all died, their children would have 
succeeded to the throne of Great Britain 
before the children of the Empress. Far 
away from the throne of England as he 
is, the young son of the King of Norway, 
whose mother is King Edward's daughter, 
is nearer to it than is the Kaiser. 



Q. — Was Hanover ever under 
British rule, and for what pe- 
riod of time? 

A. — Hanover was never under British 
rule, but an Elector of Hanover, George 
Louis, became King George I of Great 
Britain and Ireland in 1714. From that 
time until 1837 the Kings of England 
were Electors, and, later, Kings of Han- 
over as well, but Hanover was not ruled 
from London, any more than the United 
Kingdom was ruled from Hanover. Brit- 
ish Ministers always took care to keep 
the interest of Great Britain distinct from 
those of their King's other kingdom on 
the Continent. Because of this connec- 
tion with England, however, Hanover had 
a bad time before, during, and after the 
Napoleonic wars. It was regarded as a 
vulnerable outpost of Great Britain. 

Q. — Did Hanover fight Prussia? 

A.— The Hanoverians fought against 
Prussia, in 1743, were allied with Fred- 
erick the Great during the Seven Years' 
War, and in 1757 were compelled to 
abandon their country to the French. 
Next year, thanks to English gold, the 
French were cleared out. Hanoverian 
troops fought with the Allies against 
France from 1793 to 1795, when a 
treaty between France and Prussia forced 
neutrality upon them. The Prussians oc- 



cupied the country in 1801, on the sug- 
gestion of Napoleon, but two years later 
the French were again in occupation. 
After Jena, Napoleon divided Hanover 
in two. The southern half he added to 
the Kingdom of Westphalia, and the 
northern to France. With his final de- 
feat, Hanover became again independent. 



Q. — When was Hanover separated 
from the British throne? 

A.— When William IV died in 1837 and 
was succeeded by Queen Victoria, the sov- 
ereign of Great Britain ceased to be also 
ruler of Hanover, because under the dy- 
nastic laws of Hanover a woman was not 
allowed to ascend that throne. Ernest, 
Duke of Cumberland, obtained the suc- 
cession, therefore, instead of Queen Vic- 
toria. The two crowns had been united 
for 123 years. The growing power of 
Prussia was a bitter thing to the Han- 
overians, and, in the war between the for- 
mer and Austria, blind King George V of 
Hanover threw in his lot with the Aus- 
trians. He was defeated in the field, and 
Hanover was formally annexed to Prussia 
in 1866. 

Q. — How are the rulers of Europe 
inter-related ? 

A. — King George is first cousin of the 
ex-Czar and also of the Czarina. He is 
first cousin of the King of Denmark, bro- 
ther of the Queen of Norway, first cousin 
of the Queen of Spain; of the ex-King of 
Greece, of the Duke of Brunswick (who 
married the Kaiser's daughter in 1913) ; 
of the Duke of Coburg, and is related to 
many other reigning princes of Germany, 
now in the field. The King of Italy and 
the King of Serbia both married daugh- 
ters of the King of Montenegro, other 
daughters of that monarch marrying Ger- 
man and Russian princes. Ferdinand of 
Bulgaria is a nephew of Prince Albert, 
King George's grandfather. King Albert 
of Belgium is closely related to the 
Hohenzollerns, and Saxe-Coburgs, and 
the Bavarian Royal House. The Queen 
of Holland is a Princess of Nassau, and 
married Prince Henry of Mecklenburg- 
Schwerin, whose niece married the Crown 
Prince of Germany. The King of Sweden 
is a grandson of Napoleon's Marshal, 
Bernadotte, and married the daughter of 
the Grand Duke of Baden. The Emperor 
of Austria is the head of the House of 
Hapsburg, with relatives in every Court 
in Europe. The King of Spain belongs to 
that House. 



304 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — How many kings have reigned 
in Prussia since Frederick the 
Great? N 

A. — Six. The first King of Prussia 
was Elector Friedrich of Brandenburg. 
He assumed the crown as Friedrich I in 
1701. He was followed by Friedrich Wil- 
helm I in 1713. Then came Friedrich II 
(Frederick the Great) in 1740. He was 
followed by Friedrich Wilhelm II in 1786, 
then came Friedrich Wilhelm III in 1797. 
(This is the King who fought Napoleon.) 
Friedrich Wilhelm IV followed in 1840, 
then Wilhelm I in 1861. He became Ger- 
man Emperor in 1871. His son, Fried- 
rich III, succeeded in 1888 and reigned 
for three months. His son, the present 
Kaiser Wilhelm II, began his reign in 
1888. 

Q. — What was the so-called 
"Three-Emperor Year"? 

A. — 1888. Three Emperors succeeded 
each other in Germany that year, owing 
to death. Wilhelm I, his son Friedrich 
III, and the present Kaiser Wilhelm II. 

Q. — Who is the wealthiest sover- 
eign in the world? 

A. — The Mikado. His revenues, how- 
ever, are administered by the Elder 
Statesmen. He owns about 5 million 
acres, more than one-twentieth of the area 
of Japan. He holds shares in the Bank of 
Japan, Yokohama Specie Bank, Industrial 
Bank, and the Shipping Company Nippon 
Yusen Kaisha. His land holdings prob- 
ably reach 500 million dollars and his in- 
dustrial holdings 250 millions. The Ger- 
man Kaiser's property is believed to ag- 
gregate about 125 millions in value. Both 
Kaiser and Mikado have to pay many pen- 
sions and other grants out of this income. 

Q. — Does the Belgian Royal Fam- 
ily still reside in Belgium? 

A. — The village capital of La Panne 
shelters the royal family. It is in that 
ever famous little northwestern corner 
which for two years and a half has been 



all of the kingdom of Belgium under 
royal rule. 

Q. — Is ex-King Constantine of 
Greece a great soldier? 

A. — Dr. Dillon called him the world's 
greatest living strategist, but that is no 
doubt a great exaggeration. Still there is 
the fact that he led the Greeks to victory 
in both Balkan wars, and it is due to his 
military achievements that he had such 
great influence in Greece. 

Q. — What are the incomes of Eu- 
ropean monarchs? 

A. — The ruling kings get certain grants 
from the State, and in addition most of 
them have large private estates, which 
bring them in great incomes. King 
George gets most of his money not be- 
cause he is King of England, but because 
he is Duke of York, of Lancaster, etc. 
Each monarch has a civil list paid him by 
the State, and out of this he has to pay 
for his various establishments and make 
allowances to sons, daughters and other 
members of his family. In England spe- 
cial grants are made by the State to mem- 
bers of the Royal Family. Queen Alex- 
andra gets £70,000 ($350,000) a year, the 
Duke of Connaught £25,000 ($125,000) 
annually, and some half-dozen others get 
£6,000 ($30,000) a year each. The Prince 
of Wales gets about £90,000 ($450,000) a 
year revenue from the Duchy of Corn- 
wall. The revenue the King draws from 
his Duchy of Lancaster is about £70,000 
($350,000) a year. The civil lists of the 
reigning sovereigns were as follows : 

Czar of Russia $8,000,000 

Emperor of Austria 4,710,000 

German Emperor 3,850,000 

King of England 3,080,000 

King of Italy 3,000,000 

King of Belgium 660,000 

King of Greece 400,000 

Queen of Holland 400,000 

Czar of Bulgaria 400,000 

King of Sweden 391,250 

King of Denmark 275,000 

King of Serbia 240,000 

King of Roumania 500,000 

King of Norway 190,000 



WAR'S WHO'S WHO IN FIGHTERS 



Q. — Was General Wood a doctor 
at first? 

A. — Major-General Leonard Wood, 
wounded early in 1918 by a gun-explosion 
in France, served through the Geronimo 
Apache campaign in the American south- 
west as a "contract surgeon" — meaning 
that he was not regularly in the service. 
He was soon made a lieutenant and was 
one of the captors of Geronimo. In the 
war with Spain he was Lieutenant- 
Colonel of the Rough Riders. He became 
Brigadier-General, won great fame for 
his work in regenerating the city of San- 
tiago-de-Cuba, and was made Major-Gen- 
eral when Roosevelt became President. 
He then served in the Philippines ( Gov- 
ernor of Mindanao and Commander of 
the Department of the Philippines) and 
became Chief of Staff of the U. S. Army 
later. 

Q. — Was General Joffre in the 
Franco-Prussian War? 

A. — General Joseph Jacques Cesaire 
Joffre (born 1852) was second-lieuten- 
ant during the Franco-Prussian war of 
1870-71, commanding a battery in the 
siege of Paris. He served with distinc- 
tion in Asia and Africa. Appointed chief 
of the general staff of the French Army 
in 191 1, he assumed chief command at the 
beginning of the war. He was succeeded 
in active supreme command at the end of 
1916, after two and a half years, by Gen- 
eral Nivelle, whose reputation was made 
in the defense of Verdun, but who was 
soon superseded by General Petain. Gen- 
eral Joffre was then made marshal of 
France, and is now chief military adviser 
to the French Government. 

He was a popular hero in America in 
1917 when he was here as the head of the 
French mission. 

Q. — Who was Lord Kitchener? 

A. — The foremost British soldier of 
modern times, and at the time of his 
death beyond doubt the most dominant 
personality in the British Empire. His 
achievements — the conquest of the Sudan, 
the completion of the South African cam- 
paign, administration of Egyptian affairs, 
and, above all, the building up of a vast 
British fighting force for Britain's great- 
est war — place him in the front rank of 
the world's great men, as a soldier, ad- 



ministrator and military organizer. He 
was drowned in the sinking by mine or 
submarine of the British warship Hamp- 
shire off the western coast of the Orkney 
Isles June 5, 1916, while on his way to a 
consultation in Russia regarding details 
of the Allied offensive of 1916. His body 
was never recovered. 

Q. — What was Beatty's command 
in the Jutland fight? 

A. — Sir David Beatty, who was made 
Commander of the Grand Fleet of the 
British Navy in succession to Sir John 
R. Jellicoe, was present and played a gal- 
lant part in the battle of Jutland in 1916 
as commander of the First Battle Cruiser 
Squadron. In 1901 he married a daugh- 
ter of Marshall Field, of Chicago. 

Q. — Who was the chief of the Eng- 
lish Navy when war began? 

A. — Admiral Sir John R. Jellicoe (born 
1859). He had seen service in all parts 
of the world, and in August, 1914, was 
appointed Commander-in-Chief of the 
Grand Fleet. He commanded in the bat- 
tle off Jutland in 1916. He relinquished 
his place to Sir David Beatty, becoming 
First Sea Lord at the Admiralty, which 
place he retained till nearly 1918. 

Q. — Who succeeded Admiral Jelli- 
coe as First Sea Lord? 

A. — Jellicoe was succeeded by Vice- 
Admiral Sir Rossyln Wemyss, who 
stepped into his new appointment on De- 
cember 26, 1917. Wemyss commanded 
the squadron which in the early part of 
1915 protected the landing of the troops 
in Gallipoli. He is 53 years of age and 
entered the Navy in 1877. 

Q. — Is Petain really a great gen- 
eral? 

A. — He is. Verdun is by no means the 
first victory he has to his credit. He was 
a colonel when the war began, but was 
at once put in command of a brigade, and 
was General of Division before the battle 
of the Marne began. He was thus men- 
tioned in the army order of September 
21, 1914: — "Petain, General commanding 
the Sixth Division of Infantry, has, by 
his example, his tenacity, his calm under 
fire, his incessant foresight, his continual 



305 



3o6 



Questions and Answers 



intervention at the right moment, ob- 
tained from his division during fourteen 
days of consecutive fighting, a magnificent 
effort, resisting repeated attacks night and 
day, and the fourteenth day, in spite of 
his losses, repelling a very violent final 
attack." 

Q.— What else did he do? 

A. — He was placed in command of an 
army corps, and later a division of Mo- 
roccan troops joined him. He was then 
ordered to take Carency and pierce the 
German front. After three days' prepa- 
ration he did so, and broke clean through 
the enemy lines, so it is reported. So 
impossible had his colleagues thought suc- 
cess to be that they had not the neces- 
sary reserves available. Consequently, in- 
stead of being a possible turning-point of 
the war, Carency remains only a brilliant 
local victory. Petain also was responsible 
for the notable French advance in the 
Champagne. Again, it is said, reserves 
he ought to have had failed to appear at 
the crucial moment. Petain is 59 years 
old, and is unmarried. 

q. — is Haig a commander-in- 
chief? 

A.— Sir Douglas Haig (born i86i)is 
field marshal and commander-in-chief 
of the British forces in France and Flan- 
ders, being promoted when Sir John 
French was called in 1915. He was for 
many years in the cavalry, becoming ma- 
jor-general in 1904, lieutenant-general in 
1910, and general in 1914. He was at 
Khartum with Kitchener, fought for three 
years in the South African war, and saw 
much service in India. He was made 
field marshal after the Battle of the 
Somme in 1916. 

Q. — Was Hindenburg noted as a 
general before the war? 

A. — He was not famous at all, appar- 
ently not even in Germany. He was 
noted, if at all, only because military cir- 
cles knew that he had a "fad" for study- 
ing the Mazurian Lake region of East 
Prussia. 

When the Russians invaded that prov- 
ince in August, 1914, Hindenburg was 
suddenly called from retirement, and, 
through his special knowledge, got the 
victory at Tannenberg. That victory made 
him the idol of Germany, and led the 
Kaiser to create him field marshal. The 
following summer he drove the Russians 
out of Poland. After the Battle of the 
Somme which reflected little credit on 
General von Falkenhayn, that general was 



deposed as chief of the general staff and 
Hindenburg put in his place (1916). Hin- 
denburg's chief exploit as chief of staff 
has been the retreat from the Somme in 
March, 1917, a maneuver which saved the 
Germans from a very dangerous situation 
and made an end to the Battle of the 
Somme and established the famous Hin- 
denburg line. It is often asserted that 
Hindenburg is not so great a general as 
his former assistant, Ludendorff, the first 
quartermaster-general. In March, 1918, 
he began the great German offensive in 
Picardy and Flanders. 

Q. — Was General French a caval- 
ryman? 

A. — A very noted one. Field Marshal 
Sir John French, later Viscount, became 
celebrated as commander of the cavalry 
division in the South African war. He 
commanded with skill the British expe- 
ditionary force in Belgium and France 
from the beginning of the war until he 
was replaced in 1915 by Sir Douglas Haig. 
He was chief of the imperial general staff 
in 1912-14. His title is Viscount French 
of Ypres, in testimony of his gallant and 
magnificent services in that battle by 
which the Germans were frustrated in 
their design to reach Calais. 



Q. — Who was the crudest German 
commander in Belgium? 

A. — Probably that doubtful honor be-" 
longs to General Freiherr von Bissing 
(1844-1917), who was German military 
governor of Belgium, 1914-1916, and re- 
sponsible, under the higher German au- 
thorities, for the scheme of reprisals and 
deportations. General von Bissing fa- 
vored the retention of Belgium by Ger- 
many, and sought to disrupt Belgian unity 
by dividing the Flemings and Walloons 
into separate administrative districts. He 
died early in 1917. 

Q. — Who commanded the big Rus- 
sian drive of 1916? 

A. — General Alexis Brusilov. He was 
born in the Caucasus some 60 years ago. 
After the removal of the Grand Duke 
Nicholas he took command of the south- 
western army, and was in charge of the 
Russian drive in the summer of 1916, 
which cost the Austrians 300,000 men. He 
accepted the revolution of 1917, and was 
made commander-in-chief of all the Rus- 
sian armies. He was in charge of the 
Russian drive of July, 1917. but when the 
Russian armies broke down under the 
Austro-German counter drive he resigned. 



War's Who's Who in Fighters 



307 



Q. — Is Cadorna Italian command- 
er-in-chief? 

A. — General Luigi, Count Cadorna, was 
commander-in-chief until the great defeat 
of the Isonzo in November, 1917, when 
he was replaced by General Diaz. A na- 
tive of the extreme northern part of 
Italy, the borderland of Lake Maggiore, 
between Lombardy and Piedmont, he is a 
son of the General Count Cadorna who 
entered Rome with the Italian troops in 
1870 and gave the city as a capital to 
Victor Emmanuel. 

Q. — Did a German manage the 
Turkish army? 

A. — Yes. General Kolmar von der 
Goltz went to Turkey in 1883 and did 
much to reorganize the Turkish army. In 
1908 he returned to Turkey and spent two 
years in building up the Turkish army 
after the Young Turk revolution. When 
disaster overtook the Turks in the Balkan 
wars, two years after his departure, von 
der Gokz received no small blame for 
the failure of his pupils. This is prob- 
ably unjust, for the failure seems due to 
causes over which von der Goltz had no 
control. He returned to Germany in 
1910, became field marshal, and, after the 
outbreak of war and the invasion of Bel- 
gium, military governor of the latter 
country. After the entry of Turkey into 
the war, he went to Constantinople to 
direct the Turkish armies, and died, while 
at the Turkish front, April 19, 1916. 

Q. — Was Boy-Ed a sailor? 

A. — Yes. Captain Karl Boy-Ed was in 
the German Navy and was naval attache 
of the German embassy in Washington. 
He was dismissed by our Government on 
December 4, 1915, fgr "improper activity 
in naval matters." 

Q. — Was Kornilov a Cossack? 

A. — Yes. General L. G. Kornilov was a 
Siberian Cossack general, commanding 
one of the armies in the invasion of 
Galicia. During the Russian retreat he 
was captured by the Austrians, but es- 
caped. When the revolution broke out 
in March, 1917, he was appointed com- 
mandant at Petrograd, and later detailed 
to the southwestern army under Brusilov. 
He commanded one of the armies in the 
advance of July, 1917. After Brusilov's 
resignation he was made commander-in- 
chief of the Russian army, and inaugu- 
rated a series of strong military meas- 
ures against deserters and slackers. 



In September he began a march on 
Petrograd apparently with the object of 
changing the personnel of the govern- 
ment. The movement collapsed, and Gen- 
eral Kornilov was sentenced to be tried 
as a rebel. 

Q. — Does a woman own the great 
Krupp works? 

A. — Yes. The Krupp works were in- 
herited some years before the war by 
Bertha, the daughter of Frederick Alfred 
Krupp, who died in 1902. The founder 
of the works was Alfred Krupp (1812- 
1887). These great plants at Essen em- 
ploy an army of men. In 1902 the various 
Krupp works employed 43,100 persons, 
24,000 being in and around Essen. 

Q. — Was Nivelle ever French com- 
mander-in-chief ? 

A. — General Robert Nivelle succeeded 
Joffre as commander-in-chief in Decem- 
ber, 1916, and relinquished the post a few 
months later to General Petain. He was 
a colonel of an artillery regiment in the 
Battle of the Marne at the beginning of 
the war. By conspicuous gallantry he 
turned the tide at the Ourcq River and 
distinguished himself in subsequent en- 
gagements. He was called to Verdun in 
March, 1916, in the midst of the Crown 
Prince's "drive" on that stronghold. It 
has been said that he was "the heart and 
soul" of the French resistance in the 
months that followed. 

Subsequently his armies failed in a 
great offensive and there has been much 
political excitement in France about this 
affair. It was the great offensive on the 
Aisne front whose culmination came 
April 16, 1917, with terribly heavy French 
losses, though signalized by brilliant 
deeds. 

Q. — Why was General Robertson 
retired? 

A. — Ostensibly because he would not 
agree with the Versailles Conference. 
General Sir William Robertson has been 
called "the brains of the British Army." 
Since 1915 he has been chief of the im- 
perial general staff. He came out of a 
humble home in Lincolnshire, where he 
was born in i860. Entering the service 
as a trooper, he saw active service in many 
parts of the British Empire, and was 
severely wounded in one of his colonial 
campaigns. Before being called to his 
high office he commanded the first in- 
fantry division in France and was chief 



SoS 



Questions and Answers 



of staff to Field Marshal Sir John 
French. He was knighted in 1915. 

Q. — Who led the British army that 
captured German West Africa? 

A. — General Smuts, a Boer from Cape 
Colony, and a Boer leader against Eng- 
land in 1903. He succeeded to command 
of the East African Expedition in March, 
1916, and within a year had driven the 
German forces out and become the con- 
queror of Germany's colonies in West 
Africa. 

Q. — Is Von Tirpitz a Junker? 

A. — No, except in opinion and sympa- 
thy. Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz is a 
fighting man pure and simple, and his 
political competence never would have 
made him important. But as an admiral 
he became a great power. 

The present German navy was built 
under his direction, and he inspired and 
directed the German Navy League. He 
continued to hold office while other min- 
isters were dismissed. When he was 
finally retired as Secretary of the Navy, 
he became a leader of the Tory Vaterland 
party, a Pan-German party that demands 
victory and annexations. 

Q. — Which general reduced Mau- 

beuge? 

A. — General von Zwehl. According to 
American correspondents, that fortress 
fell in the anticipated ten days, and the 
prisoners numbered 40,000. 

Q. — Who is General Baden-Powell? 

A. — He is an Englishman, son of the 
Rev. Prof. Baden-Powell, of Oxford, and 
of the daughter of Admiral W. H. Smyth. 
He retired from the army in 1908, and 
devoted himself to the Boy Scout move- 
ment, which he originated. The scouts 
have done splendid service in England 
during the war, largely under his direc- 
tion. His name is pronounced Bayden- 
Poel. 

Q. — What was General Sarrail's 

command? 

A. — He was in charge of the army in 
the Verdun region, and it was he who 
reconstructed that famous fortress, for 
he was quick to learn the lesson of Liege 
and Naraur. Before the European strug- 
gle he had seen service in Algeria and 
Tunis. He is one of the youngest of the 
older French generals, being only 59. His 
name became a familiar one to the whole 
world when he was placed in charge of 



the allied troops that seized the Greek- 
Macedonian port of Saloniki and estab- 
lished the allied front across the south- 
ern Balkans. 

Q. — Who is Enver Pasha? 

A. — He is the Minister of War in Tur- 
key. He is described as a man of dic- 
tatorial temper, without any of the attri- 
butes of a dictator. Yet, he aims to be 
the dictator of Turkey; he already is dic- 
tator of her policy. Of Polish descent, 
he is Prussian by training and sympa- 
thies. He married a daughter of the 
Sultan. 

Q. — Is he a good soldier? 

A. — Physically he is dauntless and 
dashing. He fought well against the Ital- 
ians in Tripoli, but made a ghastly mess 
of things when he opposed the Bulga- 
rians. He is apparently a fine fighter but 
without much talent for scientific strate- 
gy. It was he who led the revolution 
during the Balkan war when Nazim 
Pasha was assassinated — it is said by 
Enver himself. He was also prominent 
in the movement which led to the deposi- 
tion of Sultan Abdul, in 1909. He has 
worked in absolute compliance to the 
wishes and aims of the Germans. 

Q. — Who was the von Moltke who 
was Chief of the German Gen- 
eral Staff when the war broke 
out? 

A. — The von Moltke who was Chief-of- 
Staff in 1914, and who died recently, was 
a nephew of the great strategist Count 
Helmuth von Moltke, who defeated Aus- 
tria in 1867 and France in 1870. This 
field marshal was born in 1800, and was, 
therefore, 70 years old when France and 
Prussia went to war. 

Q. — How old are the leading sol- 
diers in this war? 

A. — It is a war of young soldiers but 
of old leaders. When the struggle began 
Kitchener was 63 ; French, the greatest 
cavalry leader in Great Britain, was 61 ; 
Lord Fisher was 72; General Joffre was 
62; General Pau came out of his retire- 
ment at 66, and took the second position 
in the French Army; General Castelnau, 
third in command, was about the same 
age ; and General Gallieni, the defender 
of Paris, was 70. Von der Goltz was 
71 ; von Hindenburg 67, and von Emmich, 
who took Liege and has since died, was 
64. Von Kluck was 67, and von Moltke 
66. 



War's Who's Who in Fighters 



309 



The struggle, as it progressed, how- 
ever, gave younger men a chance. Von 
Ludendorff, who appears to share su- 
preme command with von Hindenburg 
in Germany, was only 50, but von 
Mackensen, the greatest fighting general 
the enemy have, was nearly 70. Sir 
Douglas Haig was 54; Sir David Beatty 
is one of the youngest admirals. He is 
only 45. Sir W. Robertson, Chief-of- 
Staff in Great Britain, was 56. On the 
whole admirals are considerably younger 
than generals. There is no notable gen- 
eral in the English army as young as 
Beatty. The former commander-in-chief 
of the Grand Fleet, Admiral Jellico, is 
56. Compared with the majority of the 
leaders in the field to-day, the brilliant 
soldiers of the Napoleonic era were 
youths. 



Q. — Was Bernhardi a political 
power in Germany? 

A. — No. General Friedrich von Bern- 
hardi (born 1849) was a military writer 
utterly cynical, arrogant and Prussian. 
His political importance is due only 
to his expression of militarist political 
ideas. He achieved prominence through 
his volume "Germany and the Next War' 
(i9ii). In this he sets forth with frani? 
cynicism the advantages, the necessity 
and the inevitability of a war between 
Germany and England. His argument is : 
Germany can acquire that "place in the 
sun" which is her due only by war, be- 
cause the Triple Entente — Russia, France 
and England — each and all endowed with 
vast colonial possessions which they can 
not adequately use, have been surround- 
ing Germany with a ring of iron. "In one 
way or another we must square our ac- 
count with France if we wish for a free 
hand in our international policy." For 
Germany the question is, "to be, or not 
to be." It is either "world power or 
downfall." While his book was too ex- 
pensive to be read by common people, it 
had, nevertheless, gone through eight edi- 
tions before the war. 



Q. — What war experience did Gen- 
eral Pershing have? 

A. — A great deal, before he went to 
France. In the year of his graduation 
from West Point (1886), John Joseph 
Pershing (born i860 in Missouri) was 
sent to New Mexico and Arizona to 
fight in the Apache campaign. He re- 
mained in active Indian service till the 



Sioux campaign in Dakota (1891) practi- 
cally ended Indian warfare. In 1898 he 
commanded the Tenth Cavalry in the 
fighting around Santiago de Cuba in the 
Spanish-American War. From 1899 to 
1903 he served in the Philippines. He 
was American military attache in Tokio, 
1905-1906, and as such was with Kuro- 
ki's army in Manchuria during the Russo- 
Japanese War. In 1906 he returned to 
the Philippines and had the very arduous 
task of governing Mindanao and the re- 
bellious Moros. It was a long cam- 
paign, partly military and partly diplo- 
matic, and "Jack" Pershing became 
equally famous in Washington for his 
talents in both directions. He finally 
ended Moro opposition by administering 
a decisive defeat to them in the famous 
Battle of Bagsag. 

In 1915 he commanded the Presidio in 
California, and there came a tragedy in 
his life when his wife and three daughters 
were burned to death there. 

In March, 1916, General Pershing be- 
came freshly famous when he commanded 
the celebrated expeditionary force that 
penetrated into Mexico and ended Villa's 
power for disorder. In 1917 he became 
Commander-in-Chief of the American 
Expeditionary Forces in France. 



Q. — When did General Foch first 
become known? 

A.— At the Battle of the Marne, Sep- 
tember, i9i4, when he led the 7th French 
Army Corps. He was assigned, under 
General Joffre's strategy, to oppose the 
victoriously advancing German line at a 
point south of Chalons — almost exactly 
midway between Paris and Verdun. 
Foch's army represented the French cen- 
ter. The Germans struck at it desper- 
tely on September 7 and drove the French 
south, inflicting heavy losses. Foch ral- 
lied his forces and on September 9, by a 
brilliant piece of strategy, assumed an 
utterly unexpected offensive himself, and 
drove his army clear through the Ger- 
man line, routing the famous Prussian 
Guard. It is held that this battle decided 
the Battle of the Marne. It forced the 
swift retirement of the whole German 
line. Later Foch's troops, with the Brit- 
ish, fought the tremendous Battle of 
Ypres. Foch was 67 years old when, in 
March, 1918, he was made supreme com- 
mander of not only the French, but the 
British and American forces to oppose 
the furious thrust of the Germans to- 
ward Amiens in the great Battle of Pi- 
cardy. 



WAR'S WHO'S WHO IN CIVILIANS 



Q. — Was Asquith in power when 
war began? 

A. — He was Prime Minister, a post he 
had held since 1908. It carried with it, 
under English political custom, the leader- 
ship of his party. 

He had been Home Secretary in Glad- 
stone's last_ ministry, Chancellor of the 
Exchequer in 1905, and Prime Minister in 
1908. His attitude toward foreign affairs 
was largely the moderate imperialism of 
Lord Rosebery. In domestic politics, 
while opposing the Radicals, he advocated 
social reform, home rule for Ireland, the 
democratization of the electoral system, 
and especially restrictions on the Legisla- 
tive veto of the House of Lords. The 
Parliament act of 191 1, by which the 
House of Lords lost its power to stop 
legislation passed by the Commons, was 
passed when he was Premier. In 1915, 
to avoid a general election, he established 
a coalition cabinet. The Dardanelles fail- 
ure and the Mesopotamian fiasco put his 
Government on the defensive. The op- 
position of the Northcliffe newspapers, the 
unwillingness of Lloyd George to support 
him, and the widespread feeling that his 
Government was not sufficiently energetic 
forced his resignation on December 5, 
1916. 

Q. — What has been Lloyd George's 
career? 

A. — The Prime Minister has had a not- 
able and active life. David Lloyd 
George, a Welshman (born 1863), entered 
Parliment in 1890. He drew public at- 
tention by his vigorous opposition to the 
Boer War, which he denounced in public 
meetings at decided personal risk. Never- 
theless, he entered the Liberal Cabinet of 
1005, and 1908 became Chancellor of the 
Exchequer. His first budget proposed a 
heavy tax on unoccupied land and was 
forced through the House of Lords only 
by the threat of the creation of new 
peers. He then championed the cause of 
social reforms, being the chief advocate 
of measures such as workingmen's in- 
surance. In May, 1915, he undertook the 
difficult task of directing the munitions 
production, in which labor difficulties had 
arisen. For this task a new department, 
the Ministry of Munitions, was created. 
As Minister of Munitions, Lloyd George 
was a success, and when Asquith resigned 
in December, 1916, he became Premier. 



Q. — Is Balfour a statesman of the 
democratic type? 

A. — Arthur James Balfour (born 1848) 
is a very distinguished and skilful 
statesman distinctly of the old-fashioned 
British type. He entered Parliament in 
1874, held several cabinet positions, and 
became head of the Conservative Party 
and Premier in July, 1902. He resigned 
in December, 1905, just before a crush- 
ing defeat of his party at the hands of 
the Liberals in the elections of January, 
1906.^ His leadership of the party in op- 
position was disliked, and he later re- 
signed this leadership to Bonar Law. 

When the coalition cabinet was formed 
in May, 1915, Mr. Balfour became head 
of the admiralty, and in December, 1916, 
relinquished this for the post of Secre- 
tary of State for Foreign Affairs, suc- 
ceeding Viscount Grey of Falloden. In 
this capacity he headed the British mis- 
sion to the United States in the spring 
of 1917. 

Q.— Who was the "War Chancel- 
lor" in Germany? 

A. — Dr. Theobald von Bethmann-Holl- 
weg (born 1856). He was the son of a 
famous Prussian Liberal politician and 
passed through the grades of the public 
service to the Ministry of the Interior. 
In July, 1909, he succeeded Prince Biilow 
as Imperial Chancellor, and held office 
eight years. Before the war Bethmann- 
Hollweg was considered a Liberal. He 
seems to have desired an entente with 
Great Britain, and had, apparently, 
achieved it in 1914, when, as he lamented, 
the war shattered his plans. 

In German politics he tried to hold the 
balance between the Pan-Germans and the 
Socialists, refusing to commit himself to 
any definite peace program, but his ma- 
jority was destroyed in July, 1917, when 
the Center, or Catholic, party suddenly 
allied itself with the Socialists in_ favor 
of a peace without annexations or indem- 
nities. 

Von Bethmann-Hollweg declared in the 
Reichstag that Belgium had been wronged 
under the pressure of necessity. 

Q. — Who succeeded Von Beth- 
mann-Hollweg as German 
Chancellor? 

A. — (I) Dr. Georg Michaelis (born 
1857) succeeded von Bethmann-Hollweg 
directly (in July, 1917), but lasted only 



310 



War's Who's Who in Civilians 



3" 



until November. He failed to develop 
any policy satisfactory to any party in the 
Reichstag. He had been Prussian under- 
secretary of finance and later food con- 
troller, in which office he had been nota- 
bly successful. 

(II) Count George V. von Hertling 
(born 1843) became Chancellor of the 
German Empire after November 1, 1917, 
in succession to Michaelis. A fact worth 
noting is that he is a Bavarian while his 
predecessors were Prussians. He was for 
years a professor in Bonn, then a member 
of the Bavarian Chamber. Since 1912 he 
had been Prime Minister of Bavaria. In 
politics he belongs to the conservative 
wing of the Center or Clerical party. He 
was said to be more flexible in his views 
than many German leaders and to be op- 
posed to the annexation program of the 
Pan-Germans. He has been hailed as 
recognizing parliamentary rule because he 
consulted leaders of the Reichstag. 

Q. — How many Foreign Ministers 
has Germany had since war 
began? 

A. — Four, from the beginning of war, 
to August, 1918. 

(1) Gottlieb von Jagow (born 1863) 
held the office when war began. 

(2) Dr. Alfred Zimmerman (born 
1859), appointed 1916, forced to resign 
when the United States disclosed his note 
to the German Minister in Mexico pro- 
posing an alliance of Germany, Mexico 
and Japan against the United States if 
we should enter the war. 

(3) Succeeded in 1917 by Richard von 
Kuhlmann (born 1873), who was Coun- 
cillor of the German Embassy in London 
when the war began. Then went to Hol- 
land, later was ambassador to Turkey, re- 
called to become Foreign Minister. 

(4) Paul Hintze appointed July 9, 1918, 
Admiral German Navy, had been Minis- 
ter to Norway. 

Q. — Is von Biilow playing any part 
in Europe now? 

A. — After his failure as Ambassador to 
keep Italy out of the war, he lived in 
Switzerland and became one of the mys- 
teries of the war. His book "Imperial 
Germany" (1913) is an excellent pre- 
sentation of the moderate Prussian point 
of view. 

Prince Bernhard von Biilow (born 
1849) belongs to one of the distin- 
guished families of Europe. He was 
Chancellor of the Empire from 1900 to 
1909. 



Q. — Who was Premier of France 
when war began? 

A. — Rene Viviani was Premier of 
France at the outbreak of the war, but 
gave way to M. Briand, in whose cabinet 
he accepted the post of vice president and 
Minister of Justice. He was the head 
of the French mission which visited the 
United States in May, 1917. M. Viviani 
is a gifted orator, who aroused his Ameri- 
can audiences to enthusiasm. 

The second Premier was Aristide 
Briand (born 1862), who had been 
Prime Minister several times. He be- 
gan his career as a Socialist. His most 
notable achievement was the applica- 
tion of the law separating church and 
state. In 1909 he suppressed a railway 
strike by calling the strikers to the colors, 
despite the fact that he was the leading 
member of the Socialist-Radical party. 
Briand was Prime Minister from October 
30, 1915, to March 17, 1917. 

Q. — Who was France's third war 
Premier? 

A.— Alexandre F. J. Ribot (born 1842) 
who had been Prime Minister several 
times, like Briand. He is the man who, 
between 1890 and 1893, first as Foreign 
Minister, later as Foreign Minister and 
Premier, pushed through the Franco- 
Russian agreement. Between 1895 and 
1906 he was less prominent in public life 
but when nationalism revived in France 
after 1906 Ribot again became more of a 
figure. In October, 1915, he became 
Finance Minister and in March, 1917, 
Premier. He advocated a vigorous prose- 
cution of the war but was defeated on a 
small question in August, 1917. He re- 
mained in the Government of his succes- 
sor, M. Painleve, as Minister of Foreign 
Affairs, but soon withdrew. 

Q. — Did France have a professor 
as Premier? 

A. — Paul Painleve (1863) was a scien- 
tist and scholar, a mathematician, pro- 
fessor at the Sorbonne, a brilliant chem- 
ist, a physicist, an excellent speaker, and 
leader in political life. In politics he is a 
Republican-Socialist, i. e., a moderate. At 
the opening of the war he urged the ap- 
pointment of a superior commission on 
inventions to continue the work of the 
commission on inventions of the War De- 
partment, most of whose officials had 
taken the field. He himself is reported to 
have invented the gas used against the 
Germans at Verdun. 

He was taken into the cabinet as Min- 



312 



Questions and Answers 



ister of Public Instruction, October 31, 
1915 ; was appointed to the new portfolio 
of Minister of Inventions in January, 
1916; Minister of War, 1917, where one 
of his chief acts was the appointment of 
Petain to the chief command. On the 
fall of the Ribot ministry in September, 
1917, he was called to constitute a min- 
istry from all parties (except the Unified 
Socialists) for the sole purpose of prose- 
cuting the war ; this lasted, however, only 
for a few weeks, failing in November, 
1917. 

Q. — Had Clemenceau been Premier 
before? 

A. — Georges Clemenceau (born 1841) is 
a former premier of France. For several 
years he lived in America, but returned 
to France in 1869. He entered political 
life after the war of 1870-71. Owing to 
his great power as a debater, he has al- 
ways been one of the most influential 
members of the Chamber of Deputies. 
He has probably made and unmade more 
ministries than any other Frenchman 
of recent history, and is known popu- 
larly as "The Tiger." He is the editor 
of a newspaper L' Homme Libre, which 
was censored so often during the war 
that he changed its name to L'Homme 
Enchaine. It was his scathing attack on 
Malvy, Minister of the Interior (since 
banished from France) which led to the 
fall of the Ribot ministry. 

Q. — Has the President of France 
held office throughout the war? 

A. — The President of France is elected 
(by vote of the Senate and Chamber of 
Deputies) for a period of 7 years. The 
term of the present President does not 
expire till 1920. The President of France 
has not nearly the powers of an American 
President. 

The present President is Raymond 
Poincare. He was elected January 17, 
1913. Born at Bar-le-Duc, in French Lor- 
raine. Lawyer (advocate at the court of 
Paris) and writer. Elected to the Cham- 
ber of Deputies at the age of 27, in 1893 
he became Minister of Public Instruction ; 
1894, of Finance ; 1895, of Public Instruc- 
tion; 1896, of Finance. He refused four 
other offers of ministries. He was elected 
senator, 1903, and was finally appointed 
Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign 
Affairs, 1912, which office he held until 
elected President. He has written many 
books, among others "How France Is 
Governed" (1913). He has been opposed 
by the Socialists. 



Q. — Has Serbia still a govern- 
ment? 

A. — Yes. It still has its king and cab- 
inet, though, of course, they are not in 
Serbia. Prominent in this exiled court is 
Nicholas P. Pasitch, Premier of Serbia, 
who has held office since September, 1912. 
He piloted Serbia successfully through 
the Balkan wars, and during the vicissi- 
tudes of the little nation since the Aus- 
tro-German-BuTgarian conquest (Novem- 
ber, 1915) the venerable Premier was a 
constant inspiration to his people. 

Q. — Why did Count Okuma re- 
sign as Japanese Prime Min- 
ister? 

A. — Count Shigenobu Okuma (born 
1838), after the fall of Kiachow, pre- 
sented to China a series of demands 
which the latter found unacceptable. 
After considerable negotiation a compro- 
mise was reached which gave dissatisfac- 
tion in Japan, and in October, 1916, Count 
Okuma resigned in favor of Count 
Terauchi. Count Okuma does not belong 
to one of the great clans. He has always 
given great attention to the internal de- 
velopment of Japan, and Waseda Univer- 
sity is his own creation. 

Q. — How long did the Salandra 
ministry last after Italy de- 
clared war on Austria? 

A. — One year. Antonio Salandra (born 
1853) had become Premier in March, 1914. 
He had been professor of law at the Uni- 
versity of Rome, and minister in several 
Italian cabinets. At the outbreak of the 
European war he refused to follow Ger- 
many and Austria, claiming that the 
Triple Alliance treaty had been broken by 
Austria. From this position he pro- 
gressed toward hostility to Austria and 
alliance with the Triple Entente, and, de- 
spite the opposition of Giolitti, he carried 
his policy, and Italy declared war on 
Austria in May, 191 5. He resigned as 
Premier in June, 1916. 

Q. — Who is Vittorio Orlando? 

A. — He was made Premier of Italy 
October 30, 1917. He was born in i860 at 
Palermo, became professor of administra- 
tive law in the University of Rome, then 
a deputy, then Minister of Public In- 
struction in Giolitti's cabinet, and later 
Minister of the Interior. 



War's Who's Who in Civilians 



313 



Q. — Who signed the Austrian ulti- 
matum to Serbia? 

A. — Count Leopold Berchtold (born 
1863), Austro-Hungarian Minister of 
Foreign Affairs, 1912-1915. 

Q. — Was Tisza a reactionary? 

A. — He was an uncompromising old- 
time government official. Count Stephen 
Tisza (born 1861) was a son of a fa- 
mous statesman and entered politics in 
1886, becoming Prime Minister in 1903. 
He carried through the Diet new and 
stringent rules of procedure, but had to 
resign in 1905. He returned to office in 
1913. His home policy has been one of 
inexorable Magyarization. When the new 
King, Charles IV, came to the throne 
with ideas of concessions to the non-Mag- 
yar races, the continuance of Tisza in 
power became an impossibility, and he 
resigned early in 1917- 

Q. — Is Count Czernin a German? 

A. — No. He comes from Bohemian 
Czech stock. It was a prominent family 
and Count V. zu Chudenitz Czernin (born 
J 857) entered the diplomatic service, and 
in 1914 was Austrian minister to Rou- 
mania. When his attempts to prevent 
Roumania from entering the war failed, 
he returned to Austria, fn December, 
1916, he became Minister of Foreign Af- 
fairs and president of the Joint Council 
of Ministers. His efforts were directed 
to bringing about a peace based on no 
annexations and no indemnities, working 
in alliance with the Center party in Ger- 
many and its leader, Mathias Erzberger. 
He was apparently an advocate of better 
treatment for the Slavic nationalities with- 
in the empire. 

Q. — What German politician 
caused the Reichstag resolu- 
tion for peace without annex- 
ations ? 

A. — Mathias Erzberger (born 1875), a 
member of the German Reichstag and 
leader of the Center party (Catholic 
party). In July, 1917, after a visit to 
Switzerland and Austria, where he had 
interviews with Count Czernin and Prince 
yon Biilow, he made a sensational speech 
in the Reichstag urging the conclusion of 
peace on the basis of no annexations and 
no indemnities. He brought the Center 
party into opposition to the policies advo- 
cated by Chancellor Michaelis, thus bring- 
ing into existence an opposition majority 
in the Reichstag. 



Q. — Was Viscount Grey a Conser- 
vative? 

A. — No. Sir Edward Grey, Viscount of 
Falloden, and British Secretary of State 
for Foreign Affairs at the outbreak of 
war, was a Liberal in politics. He en- 
tered Parliament in 1885, was under- 
secretary for Foreign Affairs, 1892-1895, 
and in 1905 became Secretary of State 
for Foreign Affairs in the Liberal cab- 
inet._ When he became director of British 
foreign policy, England was shifting her 
policy of isolation with regard to conti- 
nental affairs to one of participation in 
them. Grey continued this policy and 
strengthened the entente with France, and 
negotiated one with Russia. In 191 1 he 
supported France against Germany in 
Morocco, but in 1914 he negotiated a 
treaty over the Bagdad railway which 
Germans regarded as in every way satis- 
factory. An idealist and an advocate of 
internationalism in Europe, he strove 
during the Balkan wars to provide a 
settlement that should be just and satis- 
factory. In 1915 he tried, with M. 
Sazonov, to revive the Balkan League, 
and after the failure of this project and 
the collapse of Roumania, he left the cab- 
inet in December, 1916. He was raised 
to the peerage in 1916. 

Q. — Did the British appoint a Gov- 
ernor over Egypt? 

A.— No. After they deposed the Khe- 
dive,^ Abbas II, they appointed Hussein 
Kamil Sultan of Egypt on December 19, 
1914. He is the son of the Khedive Is- 
mail (1863-1879). 

Q. — Who was the first Russian 
Premier after the revolution? 

A. — Prince George E. Lvov. He held 
office only from March to June, 1917. 
He had been prominent in the zemstvos. 
and had organized a national council of 
zemstvo representatives which took over 
much of the work of supplying the Rus- 
sian armies, and in that capacity achieved 
a great success and won public confi- 
dence. He resigned in July chiefly be- 
cause he was unwilling to concede the de- 
mand for autonomy put forward by the 
Ukraine, and was succeeded by Kerensky. 

Q. — Why did Kerensky fail? 

A. — Chiefly, apparently, because he be- 
came distrusted through his efforts to 
continue the war. The Russian people 
wanted peace and suspected him, appar- 
ently, of wishing to continue war for the 
interest of other nations. His failure to 



314 



Questions and Answers 



publish the secret treaties was another 
factor in his loss of the public confidence. 
The Bolsheviki published these treaties 
the moment they gained power. 

Alexander F. Kerensky (born 1881) 
was a lawyer who had done much in 
defending workmen, political offenders, 
and Jews. He entered the Duma in 1912 
as deputy for Saratov. As leader of the 
Socialist Labor party he was prominent 
in the revolution of March, 1917. He 
gave the signal for the Duma to continue 
its sitting when the Czar ordered its dis- 
solution. Made Minister of Justice in 
the Provisional Government, he abol- 
ished the death penalty, only to restore it 
when he also assumed the portfolio of 
Minister of War. On July 22, 1917, 
Kerensky became Premier, in succession 
to Prince Lvov. His power was chal- 
lenged in September, 1917, by General 
Kornilov, and in November, 1917, by the 
Bolsheviki, who sought an immediate 
peace and the application of the princi- 
ples of radical socialism to questions of 
property in land and industry. The move- 
ment resulted in the downfall of Keren- 
sky's Government. 

Q. — Is "Trotzky" the Russian lead- 
er's real name? 

A. — No. His real name is understood 
to be Leber Bronstein. The story of 
how he came to call himself Trotzky is 
as unique as the man's whole career. He 
was imprisoned in Russia for revolution- 
ary propaganda and when he was re- 
leased he became what the Russian police 
authorities called an "illegal person," and 
so found it necessary to hide himself un- 
der an assumed name. His jailer had 
been a man named Trotzky — so he con- 
ceived the original idea of naming him- 
self so. This is his own story as he told 
it while in New York. 

Q.— What did Trotzky do in New 
York? 

A. — In New York he lived with his 
wife and two children in three rooms in 
a Bronx tenement and earned a very 
modest living by writing for the Novy 
Mir, the Russian Socialist daily, and 
speaking at Socialist meetings. He did 
not get as much weekly income as does 
the average American unskilled laborer. 

Q. — Did anybody in America ex- 
pect him to become world- 
famous ? 

A. — Apparently not even his friends. 
Those who knew him viewed him merely 



as one of many clever, fiery, fanatical, so- 
cial revolutionaries. That he would en- 
gage prominently in the Russian revolu- 
tion was expected as a matter of course. 
That he would become a world-figure 
seems not to have been imagined by his 
friends ; perhaps not by himself. 

Q. — Had Trotzky been at all prom- 
inent in Russia? 

A. — Yes. In the 1905 revolution fol- 
lowing the Russo-Japanese war, he was 
made President of the first Working- 
men's Council in Petrograd as a suc- 
cessor to the original incumbent. He 
remained president until the defeat of 
the revolution. Then he was arrested 
and exiled to Siberia. From there he 
succeeded in making his escape, and went 
to Switzerland. 

In Switzerland he founded a Socialist 
paper Prada (The Truth), which was 
printed in Russian and German both. 

In about 1910 he went to Germany but 
soon found it advisable to flee, as arrest 
had been threatened. 

Q. — Where was he when the war 
began? 

A. — He was in Vienna, went to Serbia, 
returned to Switzerland, and then went to 
Paris to edit a Russian Socialist paper 
there. Of his further career he said him- 
self while in New York: 

"When a Russian division of troops 
(in France) mutinied and killed the gen- 
eral, I addressed a severe letter of criti- 
cism of the French government to Jules 
Guesede, a Socialist member of the cab- 
inet, for the savage punishment that was 
meted out to the Russian troops. This so 
displeased the French government that* I 
was ordered out of France. I then went 
back to Switzerland, but Switzerland 
feared complications with the Czaristic 
government and would not let me in. I 
then turned to Spain. Spain would not 
have me either. I was detained at Barce- 
lona, where I was to be deported to Cuba, 
where I knew no one, and where I should 
have found myself completely stranded. 
Later the Spanish government decided to 
let me go where I pleased, provided only 
I left Spain. Every country in Europe 
practically was now closed to me, and so 
I turned my gaze across the Atlantic, 
and arrived at Ellis Island at the end of 
December, 1916." 

Q. — Where was Trotzky born? 

A.— He was born in 1878 or 1879 in^ a 
little Jewish colony in southern Russia, 
in the government of Kherson. When 



War's Who's Who in Civilians 



315 



about fourteen years of age he entered 
the gymnasium of Chernigov, and, like 
most of the passionate youth of Russia, 
soon became interested in the revolution- 
ary movements. When he was about 20 
years old, the Russian revolutionary 
movement entered one of its active 
phases. He says of this period: 
_ "I plunged into propaganda, but con- 
tinued to study sociology, political econ- 
omy and history and became a convinced 
Marxian Socialist. When the Russian 
Social Democracy split up into two sec- ' 
tions on the issue of tactics, I did not 
identify myself with either the Menshe- 
viki or the Bolsheviki, but continued to 
work for the general cause of overthrow 
of Czarism and the cause of Socialism. 
However, I leaned strongly to the rad- 1 
ical side. In other words, I was a Men- J 
shevik of the extreme left, or a near- 
Bolshevik." 

Q. — Was Lenine paid by Germany? 

A. — The documents published by our 
government confirm the charge repeat- 
edly made. Nikolai Lenine (born 1870) 
became the chief leader of the Russian 
Bolsheviki. His real name is said to be 
Vladmir Utulyanov. In the early nineties 
he became a leader of the radical Social 
Democrats of Russia. Elected to the sec- | 
ond Duma after the revolution of 1905, 
he was exiled. At the beginning of the 
war he was in Cracow, where he was in- 
terned as an enemy alien but released and 
allowed to join the colony of radical 
Russians in Switzerland. In April, i9i7, 
he reached Petrograd, where he began to 
preach immediate peace and general con- 
fiscation of land. He was the leader of 
the first Bolsheviki rising in Petrograd 
in July, 1917. After that movement was 
put down he remained in hiding, part of 
the time probably in Finland, but was in 
constant correspondence with the Bolshe- 
viki. In November, 191 7, he again headed 
an uprising of the Bolsheviki in Petro-. 
grad. 

Q. — Was Liebknecht expelled from 
the German Socialist party? 

A. — Yes. He was expelled January 13, 
1916. Karl Liebknecht. born 1871, is the 
son of Wilhelm Liebknecht, one of the 
founders of modern Socialism. He en- 
tered the Reichstag in 1912, and became 
noted for his opposition to the Govern- 
ment. In August, 1914, he voted in the 
party caucus against sustaining the Gov- 
ernment's demands of war credits, but in 
the Reichstag he voted with the majority 
to do so, in accordance with the Socialist 
theory that party members should vote as 



a unit. In December, 1914, he openly 
voted against further military credits, de- 
claring that the war was one of of de- 
fense on Germany's part. On January 13, 
1916, he was expelled from the Socialist 
party for refusing to vote with them, and 
in May, 1916, he was sentenced to four 
years and one month of prison for a 
speech delivered May 1, 1916. He served 
eight months in a fortress in 1907 for 
high treason in having written a pamphlet 
about the army. 

Q. — Was the founder of Socialism 
a German? 

_ A. — Yes. The founder of modern so- 
cialism was Karl Marx (1818-1823), a 
German of Jewish ancestry. 

Being expelled from Prussia, after liv- 
ing in Paris and Brussels he settled in 
London, where his home became a center 
for fellow exiles, is "Communist Mani- 
festo," published a few days before the 
wave of revolutio.is which swept over 
Europe in 1848, made him the head of 
the International Workingmen's Associa- 
tion. This "International" had an active 
existence from 1864 to 1870 in uniting the 
proletariat of Europe against capitalism. 

In 1859 Marx published the first vol- 
ume of his great work, "Capital." It 
teaches that all history has been a class 
struggle of patrician against plebs, of 
noble against serf, of capitalist against 
workingman. In the class struggle of the 
future, as the rich grow richer and fewer, 
and the poor grow poorer, more numer- 
ous and more discontented, the poor must 
surely triumph and seize all instruments 
of production. 

/ Marx is thus the main inspiration of the 
Social Democratic party in Germany and 
of Socialist parties in most other coun- 
tries. Leading Socialists to-day recognize 
that some of the Marxian doctrines need 



Q. — Who is Cardinal Mercier? 

A.— He was president of the great uni- 
versity of Louvain, Archbishop of Ma- 
lines until he was made a Cardinal in 
i9o7, and is a scholar of high distinction. 
When Belgium is herself again the mem- 
ory of her brave Archbishop will stand 
with that of her heroic king, and that of 
her stout army, enrolled forever in his- 
toric fame. 

When the Germans invaded Belgium he 
drew world notice by his patriotic labors 
and courage, especially by his pastoral 
letter of^ Christmas, 1914. For this he 
was forbidden by the German authorities 



3i6 



Questions and Anszvers 



to leave his episcopal residence, an act 
which drew on Germany the protest of 
the Pope. 

Q. — Was Lord Northcliffe always 
a journalist? 

A. — He began poor in a common- 
place little weekly paper that had a big 
circulation among certain classes in Eng- 
land. He is now the owner of of the Daily 
Mail, the great London Times, and many 
other publications. His name is Alfred 
Harmsworth. He was born in 1865 and 
was in America as the head of various 
British war missions. 

Q. — Was Nietzsche a leader of 
popular thought in Germany? 

A. — He was a modern philosopher and 
the large public knew him only by name, 
if it knew him at all. Friederich Wil- 
helm Nietzsche dealt in abstract thoughts 
in which large publics have no interest. 
Born in 1844, he became professor of 
classical philology at Basel, 1869. HI 
health caused his resignation, 1870. He 
was comparatively well until 1888, but his 
vigorous mind broke down and he be- 
came hopelessly insane in 1889. 

Nietzsche insists that individuals of 
higher culture must assert themselves for 
the sake of civilization. They must op- 
pose conventional ideas and customs. 

While of course Nietzsche was a mys- 
tical thinker, not a political writer, his 
doctrine of the superman, not subject 
to ordinary laws, has undoubtedly in- 
fluenced German thought and actions — 
with disastrous results. 

Q. — Has a Pope died since the war 
began? 

A.— Yes. Pope Pius X (born 1835) 
died on August 20, 1914. His death is 
said to have been hastened by the out- 
break of the war. On August 19, the day 
before his death, he issued an appeal for 
peace. 

Q. — Is the present Pope an Ital- 
ian? 

A. — Yes. Benedict XV Giacomo della 
Chiesa (born 1854) and pope since the 
death of Pius X in 1914, was formerly 
cardinal archbishop of Bologna. 

Q. — Is Count Reventlow a German 
official? 

A. — No. Count Ernst zu Reventlow i« 
a furiously Pan-German extremist jour- 
nalist (born 1871), whose writings in the 



Deutsche Tages-Zeitung have been disin- 
guished for their bitter and uncompro- 
mising hatred of the United States. He 
has written a book on German foreign 
policy, "Dcutschlands Auswartige Poli- 
tik, 1888-1914." 

Q. — Is Thomas, the French poli- 
tician, a Socialist? 

A. — He is one of the leading Socialists 
of Europe. He is the son of a baker 
and became a Socialist, joining the ex- 
treme party, the Unified Socialists. Suc- 
cessively he was elected a municipal coun- 
cillor, mayor, deputy to the French 
Chamber. At the outbreak of the war, he 
started as sergeant, then became a lieu- 
tenant. Consulted continually by Mille- 
rand, Minister of War, on the subject of 
munitions, he was made undersecretary 
for munitions. In the reorganized cab- 
inet of December, 1916, with only five 
members in the war council, he was made 
Minister of Munitions. He stood strongly 
against allowing French Socialist dele- 
gates to go to the Stockholm Conference 
in 1917. He resigned in September, 1917, 
because Premier Ribot could not give a 
definition of the war aims of France sat- 
isfactory to the United Socialists. As 
the latter party would enter no ministry 
with Ribot, Thomas was not included in 
the Painleve ministry of September, 1917. 

Q. — What has made Trietschke 
famous? 

A. — The whole world has found abun- 
dant material in his writings to prove 
German lust for conquest. He was a his- 
torian, and though born a Saxon, he be- 
lieved in Prussia as the State which could 
best unite Germany. He became profes- 
sor of history in the University of Berlin. 
His lectures were crowded with students. 
His pronouncements on German policy in 
the Prcussiche Jahrbiicher determined 
opinion. He wrote history that glorifies 
the rise of Prussia; he acclaimed the 
union of Germany and the annexation of 
Alsace-Lorraine as he saw it realized 
through the Franco-Prussian war; he in- 
sisted upon the concentration of power in 
the German State and on the dominant 
position of that State in Europe. He was 
also a rabid opponent of England. 

Q. — Is Venizelos a Greek? 

A. — He was born in the island of 
Crete, in 1864. He first entered Greek 
politics in 1909, when he was summoned 
by the king and helped to pilot the coun- 
try through the Balkan wars. From the 
beginning of the European conflict he fa- 



War's Who's Who in Civilians 



317 



vored the cause of the Allies, and urged 
King Constantine to join them. But the 
king twice dismissed his masterful Pre- 
mier, who at last set up a Provisional 
Government at Saloniki for the defense 
of Greece. After the abdication of Con- 
stantine on June n, 1917, Venizelos again 
became Premier with the power of the 
Allies behind him. 

Q. — Was von Bernstorff in Amer- 
ica long before the war? 

A. — Count J. H. von Bernstorff (born 
1862) was in this country for six years 
before the war, having been appointed 
German ambassador to the United States 
in 1908. He was absent from his post at 
the outbreak of the war, but returned at 
once. He was handed his passports on 
February 3, 1917, immediately after Ger- 
many's announcement of unrestricted 
warfare. Since his return to Germany he 
has been appointed ambassador to Tur- 
key in succession to Dr. von Kuhlmann, 
who became Foreign Minister. 

Q. — What ambassadors and min- 
isters were in Washington 
when we declared war on Ger- 
many? 

A. — Belgium, M. E. de Cartier de 
Marchienne ; Brazil, Senhor Domicio da 
Gama ; China, Dr. V. K. Wellington Koo ; 
Cuba, Dr. Carlos de Cespedes ; France, 
M. Jules Jusserand ; Great Britain, Sir 
Cecil Spring-Rice ; Greece, M. A. Vouros 
(charge) ; Guatemala, Sehor Don Joa- 
quin Mendez ; Italy, Count Macchi di Cel- 
lere ; Japan, Mr. Aimaro Sato ; Panama, 
Sehor Don Belisario Porras ; Portugal, 
Viscount d'Alte ; Russia, Prof. Boris 
Bakhmeteff ; Serbia, Mr. Lioubomir 
Michailovitch ; Siam, Phya Prabha Kara- 
vongse. 

Q. — Who were our Ambassadors 
when we declared war on Ger- 
many? 

A.-— Belgium, Brand Whitlock; Brazil, 
Edwin V. Morgan ; China, Paul S. 
Reinsch ; Cuba, William E. Gonzales ; 
France, William G. Sharp; Great Britain, 
Walter H. Page ; Greece, Garrett Drop- 
pers ; Guatemala, William H. Leavell ; 
Italy, Thomas Nelson Page ; Japan, 
Roland S. Morris ; Panama, William J. 
Price; Portugal, Thomas H. Birch; Rou- 
mania, Charles J. Vopicka ; Russia, David 
R. Francis; Serbia, H. Percival Dodge 
(special agent) ; Siam, George P. Inger- 
soll. 



Q. — What charges were made 
against Bolo Pasha? 

A. — Paul Bolo, better known as Bolo 
Pasha, was formally charged with having 
maintained communication with the ene- 
my in Switzerland in 1915 and in Paris 
the same year, when he received German 
money from Cavallini to further the paci- 
fist movement ; in the United States in 
1916, for having received through Paven- 
stedt and the Deutsche Bank German 
money to influence the French newspa- 
pers, and for advancing money to the 
director of the Paris Journal. 

He was sentenced to death in Febru- 
ary, 1 918. 

Q. — How old are the English lead- 
ers? 

A. — Lloyd George is one of the young 
men of the cabinet, being only 53 when he 
became Prime Minister. He was a year 
younger than W. M. Hughes, ex-premier 
of Australia, who was 54. Asquith was 
64, Balfour was 68, Bonar Law 58, Cham- 
berlain 53, McKenna 53, Harcourt 54, 
Birrell 67, Curzon 58 in 1916. Herbert 
Samuel was the youngest Minister in the 
Asquith Cabinet, being only 46. 

Q. — Who was Jean de Bloch? 

A. — The author of a famous and monu- 
mental work on war. It was published 
sixteen years ago, and showed that mod- 
ern war must become trench fighting, and 
that entire nations must inevitably be- 
come engaged. His forecasts were won- 
derfully accurate. H. G. Wells says that 
he was much studied in Germany and his 
lessons were taken to heart, but in Eng- 
land few knew about him. He was a 
banker of Warsaw, a Russian Jew. He 
made the study of war his hobby, and 
labored hard to promote the cause of in- 
ternational arbitration, holding' that war 
entailed such ghastly suffering that every- 
one who could do so should work to 
make its outbreak impossible. He spent 
a large fortune to this end. He died a 
few years ago. He was utterly wrong, 
however, in a chief part of his prophecy 
— that the monstrous cost of modern war 
would make a long war impossible. 

Q. — Is it a fact that Lord Chelms- 
ford's family name is Thesiger? 

A. — The present Lord Chelmsford is 
the third baron. His grandfather was 
Frederic Thesiger, twice Lord Chancellor 
of England, whose brother, Sir Frederic 
Thesiger, was Naval A. D. C. to Nelson 
at Copenhagen. The first baron's father 



3i8 



Questions and Answers 



was a Saxon who had migrated to Eng- 
land, where he became secretary to Lord 
Rockingham. The German strain in the 
present_ Viceroy of India is, therefore, 
very slight. 

Q. — Who is Henri Bourassa? 

A. — He is a French-Canadian, and one 
of the most picturesque figures in pub- 
lic life in the Dominion. He is an anti- 
Imperial Socialist, editor of ,the paper L 
Devoir, published in Montreal. He is a 
member of Parliament, and has a very 
strong and devoted following of French- 
Canadians. He strongly opposed the 
raising of troops in Canada during the 
Boer war, and campaigned against Ca- 
nadian participation in the present strug- 
gle. 

Q. — Who is Maximilian Harden? 

A. — One of the very important journal- 
ists and publicists of Europe. In his 
youth he was a friend and to some extent 
a confidant of Bismarck. During the past 
decade he has published a paper Die Zu~ 
kunft ("The Future"), which has voiced 
the most liberal opinion in Germany. 
Some years ago Die Zukunft became fa- 
miliar to the whole world through Har- 
den's bold attack on certain highly placed 



men who were close to the Kaiser. Har- 
den triumphed, despite suits for libel that 
were brought by the assailed men. The 
Kaiser dismissed them, and there was a 
great political clearance. 

Since the war began he has been one 
of the few Germans who measurably kept 
their heads. Almost consistently he has 
warned his own people that they must 
not think all the wrong-doing is on the 
side of their enemies. 

Q. — Is Lord Milner a German? 

A. — According to the British law, that 
is to say, jus soli, he would be so re- 
garded as he was born in Bonn in Ger- 
many. According to German or French 
law, that is to say, jus sanguinis, he would 
be regarded as an Englishman, for his 
father was British in the eyes of that law, 
although, according to English law, he, 
too, was a German. Lord Milner's grand- 
father was an Englishman but he mar- 
ried in Germany and Lord Milner's father 
was born at Bonn on the Rhine. His 
mother was English. 

He went to Africa as High Commis- 
sioner and Governor of Cape Colony in 
1897, and remained there as High Com- 
missioner and Administrator of the con- 
quered Transvaal and Orange Free State 
until he retired in 1905. 



THE WORKERS 



Q. — What is the biggest American 
labor organization? 

A. — The American Federation of Labor, 
formed in 1881. It is a federation, or 
union, of 109 national and international 
unions, each of which maintains its own 
individual existence, while giving up cer- 
tain powers to the common head. 

The Knights of Labor, who had sought 
to merge all the separate unions into one 
national organization, gave way before 
the federation movement in the years 
1885-1890. A few important national 
unions, such as the four railroad brother- 
hoods, and the national window-glass 
workers, are not affiliated with the federa- 
tion. The paid-up membership of the 
federation is now approximately 2,070,000. 
Its headquarters are in Washington, D. 
C, its president is Samuel Gompers, its 
secretary Frank Morrison, and its official 
organ the American Federationist. 

Q. — Do most American working- 
men belong to labor unions? 

A. — No. There are about 30,000,000 
men in the United States who earn their 
living with their hands. Less than 3,000,- 
000 are affiliated with labor unions. 

Q. — Has American labor been con- 
scripted? 

A. — No. There has been talk of it, not 
officially, but among some factions repre- 
senting various opinions, about the best 
way to conduct war. The workingmen 
have answered the suggestion with the 
general reply that if labor is conscripted, 
capital also must be conscripted. 

Q. — Has any state passed a com- 
pulsory labor law? 

A. — Yes. Maryland and West Virginia 
recently passed laws providing that every 
man must work at least thirty-six hours 
a week, and New York and New Jersey 
have enacted that idlers, rich or poor, 
shall be fined and jailed. This, it must 
be noted, is not "conscription of labor." 
It is conscription of idle persons, in so far 
as it can be called "conscription" at all. 

Q. — What is sabotage? 

A. — The organized hampering of pro- 
duction by slack work, the skillful dis- 



abling of machinery, or the publication of 
trade secrets as a part of the "class 
struggle" between employing classes and 
labor. The practice first came into prom- 
inence in France in 1895, and it was for- 
mally approved at the Congress of the 
French General Confederation of Labor 
in 1897, and the approval was reaffirmed 
at the Congress of 1900. 

Q. — What was the origin of the 
word boycott? 

A. — Ireland gave it to us, as she has 
given so many expressive words. Parnell 
in 1880 advised the people to punish a man 
for taking a farm from which another 
had been evicted "by isolating him from 
his kind as if he were a leper of old." 
The first victim of the new system was 
the agent of Lord Erne, an absentee 
landlord, who had estates in Mayo. This 
agent refused to accept rents at figures 
fixed by the tenants, and was treated ac- 
cording to Parnell's advice. His servants 
were forced to leave him, his crops were 
left to rot in the fields, even the post and 
telegraph were interfered with. The 
agent's name was Captain Boycott, and 
the name of the first victim was given to 
the system. 

Q. — How many motor cars were 
produced in the United States 
in 1916? 

A. — Motor vehicles produced : 1916, 
1,617,708; 1915, 892,618. Passenger cars 
sold: 1916, 1,525,578; 1915, 842,229. Mo- 
tor trucks sold: 1916, 92,130; 1915, 50,369. 
Retail value of motor vehicles sold : 1916, 
$1,088,028,273; 1915, $691,778,950. Aver- 
age price of passenger cars : 1916, $605 ; 
1915* $672. Number of cars and trucks 
exported first ten months: 1916, 67,616; 
I 9i5, 53,38o. Value of cars and trucks ex- 
ported first ten months : 1916, $100,147,- 
636; 1915, $94,434,432. It is estimated that 
in California there is one motor car to 
eleven of the population. 

Q. — Are women doing men's work 
in all belligerent countries? 

A.— -In England, France, Germany and 
Austria, women have largely replaced 
men in many industries. In Russia and 
Italy women always have been accus- 
tomed to working in the fields and in 
certain other manual occupations, and, 



319 



320 



Questions and Answers 



since the war, they have been more than 
ever responsible for the sowing and gath- 
ering in of the crops. 

Q. — What work do the women do? 

A. — In England half a million, at least, 
are working in munition factories. They 
act in the entire country as tram and bus 
conductors, taxi drivers, chauffeurs and 
elevator operators. In addition they do 
heavier work, cart and deliver coal, act 
as laborers in many districts, and, in Bir- 
mingham, for instance, have replaced men 
as road-workers. They were urged to 
work in the fields, but the response was 
not as great as was hoped. In France 
and Germany women work in the muni- 
tion factories, and, in fact, in all manner 
of occupations usually reserved exclus- 
ively for men. 

Q. — Do English women munition 
workers get men's wages ? 

A. — "Equal pay, equal work," has been 
the formula adopted ever since the Min- 
ister of Munitions took over the factories. 
Women were all paid at the same piece 
rates as men, and a time rate was fixed at 
li ($4.87) a week. The original arrange- 
ment has been slightly amended since, and 
provides for the payment of £1 for a 48- 
hour week to women of eighteen years 
and over, and an extra 6-pence (about 
12 cents) an hour for all additional work. 

This rate, however, applies only to the 
national factories, and has not been ex- 
tended to the private establishments, 
where, apparently, women have been 
working on munitions of war for 5 and 6 
cents an hour. In the national factories 
the rate is 8 and 9 cents. It is pointed 
out, however, by the National Federa- 
tion of Women Workers that a pound a 
week is, according to pre-war standards, 
worth now only $3.25 a week, and it is 
being paid for work formerly done by 
men, and admittedly of vital importance 
to the nation. In a recent inquiry it 
came out that in many branches of muni- 
tion making not under direct Govern- 
ment control women were only getting 
$3-37 a week. 

Q. — How many German women are 
in industries? 

A. — Helferich, German Minister for 
Internal Affairs, gave figures in the 
Reichstag concerning the employment of 
women in Germany. He did not men- 
tion the actual numbers, merely giving 
percentages. On July 1, 1914, the pro- 
portion of women employed in the elec- 



trical industries was 24 per cent; on 
July 1, 1915, it was 55 per cent. In other 
industries the respective figures were : — 
Chemicals, 7 per cent to 23 per cent; met- 
allurgy and engineering, 7 per cent to 19 
per cent ; textures, 54 per cent to 64 per 
cent; wood-working, 15 per cent to 26 
per cent; clothing, 53 per cent to 64 per 
cent; agriculture, 32 per cent to 45 per 
cent ; building, 3 per cent to 9 per cent. 
There are probably far more women now 
employed, as a general mobilization of 
the German population occurred in 1916. 

Q. — Have Chinese workmen been 
sent to France? 

A. — They have been there some time, 
and, according to neutral papers, have 
given great satisfaction. One hundred 
thousand were originally contracted for, 
the arrangement having been made 
through the Chinese banks at a fixed rate 
per head. 

Q. — How many countries have 
adopted daylight saving? 

A. — Great Britain was the first to pro- 
pose the scheme. William Willet, a Lon- 
don builder, advocated it for years, but 
Parliament always blocked the bill. Ger- 
many adopted the principle on May 1, 
1916. Great Britain followed suit on 
May 21, and most European countries 
then put the clock forward an hour. Hol- 
land, having such close trade relations 
with Germany, quickly copied her, and 
Austria-Hungary did the same. Italy 
came into line on June 3. The Danes 
were, however, the first to follow Ger- 
many, putting the clock forward on 
May 15. 

Q. — When did America adopt it? 

A. — The bill to save daylight was passed 
by Congress on March 15, 1918. It pro- 
vided that at 2 a. m. of the last Sunday 
of March in each year the clocks should 
be advanced one hour and at 2 a. m. of 
the last Sunday in October they were to 
be set back again one hour, and thus re- 
turned to the old time for the months of 
short days. Five time-zones were estab- 
lished to conform with the zones for 
standard time that had always existed. 

Q. — Are the Germans working the 
Belgian and French mines? 

A. — Dr. Dillon says they are, and that 
no fewer than 40,000 Belgian and French 
miners are doing the work. Dutch re- 
ports confirm this, and state that all the 



The Workers 



3^1 



coal is sent to Germany. Timber is also 
being cut from the Belgian forests. The 
figures as to the Belgian labor employed 
have been exceedingly conflicting. Be- 
fore the war about 200,000 work people 
had been regularly engaged in coal and 
iron mining and quarrying. 



Q. — What wages are paid in 
China? 

A. — J. P. Donovan, in The Empire Re- 
view, says : "Although the cost of labor 
has risen in China, as in other countries, 
during the past twenty years, it is still 
low when compared with what is paid for 
the same kind in either Europe or Amer- 
ica. Ordinary laborers receive from 12s. 
to 18s. a month ($3 to $4.50), while the 
wages of skilled laborers and mechanics 
rarely exceed from £2 to £3 ($10 to $15) 
a month. In the Hanyang steel works, 
which was started by the Viceroy Chang- 
Chih-tung and where some 5,000 men are 
employed, ordinary laborers receive about 
$3 a month. Women reelers in the silk 
factories in Shanghai earn less than 25 
cents a day for eleven hours' work. Gen- 
erally speaking, laborers in the interior 
are paid 6d. to od. (12 to 18 cents) a day, 
for which they work from ten to twelve 
hours." 



Q. — Is there shortage of British 
miners ? 

A. — The number of persons employed 
in the mines in May, 1915, was 953,642, a 
decrease of 180,104 from the number em- 
ployed during the period January-July, 
1914. The output of coal for the year 
1913 was 287,411,869 tons; in 1914, 265,- 
643,030 tons; in 1915, there was a further 
decline, the production being 253,179,446 
tons, which made 34,232,423 tons less in 
1915 than in 1913. In 1913, 73,400,118 
tons were exported ; in 1914, 70,561,402 
tons; in 1915, 50,576,078 tons; and in 
1916, 46,112,155 tons. These totals in- 
clude the coal taken on steamers for their 
own use. Since Italy, Spain, Greece and 
Norway rely almost entirely upon coal 
from overseas, it is evident that nothing 
like the requirements of these countries 
have been met since the war began. Ger- 
many used to send coal to some of these 
places, and France used to produce what 
she wanted. All must now look to Eng- 
land or to America, and the above fig- 
ures show that Great Britain exported 
27,000,000 tons less in 1916 than in 1913, 
so they must have gone very short. 



Q. — How did England settle the big 
191 6 railway dispute? 

A. — The men asked for an increase of 
10 shillings a week on all wages, basing 
their demand on the rise in the cost of 
living. They obtained exactly half what 
they asked for, but in the form of a war 
bonus, not as increase of wages. In 
October, 1915, a war bonus of 5 shillings 
was paid by the railway companies. 
Since then it has been increased to 10 
shillings. The increase means that the 
men are now getting on the average a 
third more in wages than they did before 
the war started ; but as the cost of food 
has increased more than 100 per cent, 
and the general cost of living has gone 
up nearly 75 per cent, the men declare 
that they actually are worse off now than 
when the war began. The Government, 
by the way, has to pay the bonus of 10 
shillings a week. The companies do not, 
although they made the arrangement with 
the men. 

Q. — On what terms did the English 
Government take over the rail- 
ways? 

A. — The agreement made by the Board 
of Trade was that the Government leased 
the railways from the twenty-nine com- 
panies concerned for the period of the 
war on the basis of their net earnings in 
1913, less i2 J / 2 per cent of the war bonus 
granted to the men, and that out of this 
rental the companies had to meet any 
addition to their interest charges. 

Q. — How many women are em- 
ployed in British industries? 

A. — Omitting domestic servants and 
women at work in military, naval and 
Red Cross hospitals, it is estimated that 
nearly 5,000,000 women are directly em- 
ployed in various occupations in Great 
Britain. 

Q. — How many were employed be- 
fore the war? 

A. — About 3,750,000. Since the war 
1,250,000 men have been directly replaced 
by women. 

Q. — How many war factories are 
there in Great Britain? 

A. — In December, 1916, the Minister of 
Munitions announced that the total num- 
ber of controlled establishments in the 
United Kingdom was 4,585. 



SPIES, TRAITORS AND ALIEN ENEMIES 



Q. — What is a spy? 

A.— Article 82 of the United States Ar- 
ticles of War says: "Any person who in 
time of war shall be found lurking or 
acting as' a spy in or about any of the 
fortifications, posts, quarters or encamp- 
ments of any of the armies of the United 
States, or elsewhere, shall be tried by a 
court-martial or by a military commission 
and shall, on conviction thereof, suffer 
death." 

Hague Rule XXIX, and the "Rules of 
Land Warfare" (General Staff, U. S. A., 
1914) define a spy as a person who clan- 
destinely or on false pretences endeavors 
to obtain information with the intention 
of communicating it to the hostile party. 

Soldiers in their own uniform who pen- 
etrate hostile lines for information are 
not considered spies. They are spies if 
they wear false uniform or any disguise. 



q. — is an enemy alien that gives 
information a spy? 

A. — Yes. Any person, no matter what 
the nationality may be, is guilty of spying 
if he tries to send information out of the 
country, directly or indirectly, with intent 
of aiding the enemy. 

Technically, it might be held that the 
information must be of military nature; 
but in this war there has come such an 
intimate and intricate inter-relation of 
military, industrial and political matters, 
that the tendency would be to charge that 
even political information was so designed 
to give "aid and comfort to the enemy" 
that it comes under either espionage or 
treason. 



Q. — Is a man who is confessedly a 
German officer a spy? 

A.— Not if he has informed the govern- 
ment promptly and voluntarily of his 
presence and rank. If he conceals the 
fact, and is arrested subsequently and 
charged with being a spy, it still would 
be necessary to prove that he collected 
information with intent to send it to his 
army. But the concealment would make 
a grave count to begin with, and would, 
no doubt, be held as presumption in it- 
self that he was a spy, because one of 
the "acid tests" of a spy is his clandes- 
tine character. 



Q. — Is a woman of German birth 
who accidentally learns some- 
thing of importance and tells 
it, a spy? 

A. — It depends on the person to whom 
she tells it, and her intent in telling it, 
and, of course, the nature of the infor- 
mation. If her intention in telling it is 
to convey information of value to the 
enemy, she is guilty of a crime that is 
grave in war, whether it be committed 
by an alien or a native. 

The fact that she obtained the infor- 
mation accidentally would not in itself 
necessarily clear her from the charge of 
being a spy.though it might be accepted 
as presumptive evidence in her favor. 

If she obtained the information acci- 
dentally and simply repeated it through 
the habit of gossip, she would be in the 
same category as any American-born 
woman guilty of the same thing, but she 
would have a more difficult task to clear 
herself of suspicion. 

Q. — What actions lay a person 
open to being shot as a spy? 

A. — Any activity that would tend to 
gather information valuable to an enemy 
will subject a person in time of war to 
the charge of being a spy. Within a 
military zone actions that might be quite 
innocent elsewhere often are highly sus- 
picious, and the apprehended person will 
have a much harder time explaining 
these actions than he would have out- 
side of such military zones. This is not 
an unfair rule in itself, for civilians and 
even soldiers, who are not called by ac- 
tual business into such a zone, have no 
business there. 

The almost universal military punish- 
ment for spying is death ; and the death 
sentence may be inflicted even if a spy 
has not succeeded in getting any infor- 
mation or in transmitting it to the enemy. 

Q. — Are spies shot without trial? 

A. — The Hague Conventions provide 
that a spy, even when taken in the act, 
"should not be punished" without previ- 
ous trial. If a spy happens to be caught 
by soldiers engaged at the moment in 
fighting for their lives, his chances 
probably are not particularly good. If, 
however, a spy is brought before officers, 
he should, and as a rule does, get a 



322 



Spies, Traitors and Alien Enemies 



323 



trial. Among troops engaged in active 
operations, however, the method of trial 
is pretty swift and not very lenient. 

Q. — What is a court-martial? 

A. — It is a military court, composed 
wholly of soldiers — army officers in army 
matters and navy officers in naval mat- 
ters. In peace-times a court-martial 
usually is assembled with much care and 
full time is given to the case. In war, 
courts-martial are assembled quickly, and 
the manner of trial generally depends on 
the conditions at the given moment, the 
amount of time at the disposal of the 
court, the attitude of the members, etc. 
The accused may have military counsel 
assigned to him by the court, but he has 
not the right to demand counsel of his 
own selection. A summary court-martial 
may last only a few minutes. 

A fundamental difference in principle 
between courts-martial and civil courts 
is this : a civil court is supposed in law 
to look after the interest of the defend- 
ant very carefully. He is presumed to be 
innocent until convicted. A court-mar- 
tial, while it is expected to be just, looks 
after the interests of its own army first, 
second and all the time. 

Q. — Can a person giving informa- 
tion to his own government be 
shot as a spy? 

A. — Yes. He may be punished either 
as a spy or as a "war traitor," according 
to the nature of the case. Paragraph 204 
of the U. S. A. "Rules of Land War- 
fare" says: "If the citizen or subject of 
a country or place invaded or conquered, 
gives information to his own government, 
from which he is separated by the hos- 
tile army, or if he gives information to 
the army of his government, he is a war 
traitor." 

Q. — What is the difference be- 
tween a spy and a "war 
traitor"? 

A. — The term was devised by soldiers 
to fit the case of the inhabitants of an 
invaded district who try to give news to 
their own army or government. These 
people obviously lack the "clandestine" 
character of spies, since they have not 
entered the invading lines purposely, but 
are caught within them against their 
will. 

To meet this case, the world's legal 
military minds have devised the crime of 
"war treason." Any information, aid or 
comfort that the inhabitants of invaded 
districts give to their own side, and any- 



thing they may do to hamper or injure 
the invaders is "war treason." They may 
not even offer voluntarily to serve as 
guides to their own government's army. 

The punishments for "war treason" are 
the same as for spying. A "war traitor" 
usually is shot pretty summarily. 

Q. — Is spying a crime in peace- 
times? 

A. — It is, but it is usually limited 
wholly to such spying as actually deals 
with military secrets. Foreign officers 
and soldiers, for instance, may move 
freely in another country, during peace- 
time, without wearing uniforms or other- 
wise declaring themselves, and they will 
not be considered spies unless they actu- 
ally try to get military secrets either by 
subterfuge or by corrupting somebody. 

In time of war, on the contrary, any 
officer or soldier of a belligerent power 
caught in the territory of another bel- 
ligerent, in civilian clothes, would be con- 
sidered as being in disguise; and being 
in disguise is one of the important counts 
in declaring men guilty of being spies. 

Q. — Is spying in peace-times pun- 
ished by death? 

A. — It may be, but it very rarely is. 
All the European governments have 
more or less elaborate "secret service" 
organizations for getting military secrets, 
and for that reason spy-trials are han- 
dled rather delicately in times of peace, 
and the most usual punishment is a term 
in prison. 

Some time before the big war, Great 
Britain caught some German army officers 
and Germany caught some British army 
officers in the act of gathering military 
information. Both parties were in civilian 
garb, and each government tried its cap- 
tives with astonishing politeness and 
caution. The men were sentenced in 
each case to fairly long prison terms, 
but it was generally understood by both 
nations that the sentences were to be car- 
ried out without subjecting the prisoners 
to the onus of felons, and there were 
guarded suggestions that they might, in 
fact, be released as soon as possible. 

Q. — Is a person who tries to get 
commercial and other non- 
military secrets in peace-times 
a spy? 

A. — No. The laws of all nations 
against espionage cover only espionage 
for military purposes. A man trying to 
get commercial secrets may render him- 



324 Questions and Answers 

self liable to punishment if he corrupts As a matter of fact, all governments 

government officials, or private em- keep commercial and consular agents in 

ployees, or otherwise tries wrongfully to the territory of other nations to gather 

get information, but that is a matter of commercial and industrial information, 

common law that has nothing to do with and this is done not only openly but by 

espionage. mutual consent 



BELGIUM'S LONG TORMENT 



Q. — Were charges of atrocities by 
the German armies officially in- 
vestigated? 

A. — They were investigated by the 
Bryce Committee, appointed December 
15, 1914, in Great Britain under Viscount 
Bryce, once Ambassador to the United 
States, and by the Belgian Commission of 
Inquiry under M. Van Iseghem, President 
of the Court of Cassation, appointed 
August 7, 1914. 

Q. — What were the conclusions of 
the investigators? 

A. — Both bodies issued voluminous re- 
ports and found that the charges had been 
proved beyond doubt A French official re- 
port attested to the same conclusion in 
I9I5- 

Q. — What was the summary of the 
charges? 

A. — The Belgian Commission declared 
that : thousands of unoffending civilians, 
including aged people, women and chil- 
dren, had been killed by the invaders ; that 
women had been outraged ; that German 
soldiers entering towns maddened them- 
selves with drink; that soldiers and offi- 
cers looted on a gigantic scale ; that booty 
was sent back to Germany by connivance 
of the authorities ; that pillage had been 
accompanied with wanton destruction ; 
that human beings were burnt alive during 
the burnings of towns, villages and 
houses ; that hostages were taken, thus 
making innocent people responsible for 
the acts of others ; that large numbers had 
been forced to labor against their will or 
had been carried to Germany; that cities 
and communes had been fined because of 
Belgian military successes ; that civilians 
had been used as screens. 

Q. — Did the Bryce Committee 
make the same findings? 

A. — Yes. Its conclusions were that 
"murder, lust and pillage prevailed over 
many parts of Belgium on a scale un- 
paralleled in any war between civilized 
nations during the last three centuries." 

Q. — Were these conclusions based 
on much evidence? 

A. — More than 1,200 depositions had 
been gathered in England for 3 or 4 
months before the Bryce Committee was 
appointed. These were exhaustively con- 



sidered with many new ones (together 
with a large number of diaries taken from 
German dead), and the collected evidence 
forms a great mass of published docu- 
ments. The Belgian report was based on 
an equally large mass of testimony. 

Q. — Where and when were these 
crimes committed? 

A. — "If a line is drawn from the Belgian 
frontier to Liege and continued to Char- 
leroi, and a second line from Liege to 
Malines, a figure resembling an irregular 
Y will be formed. It is along this Y that 
most of the systematic (as opposed to iso- 
lated) outrages were committed. The 
period from August 4 to August 30 will 
be found to cover most of these. Ter- 
monde and Alost extend beyond the Y 
lines, and they belong to September. 
Murder, rape, arson, and pillage began the 
moment the German army crossed the 
frontier. For the first fortnight the vil- 
lages near Liege were the chief sufferers. 
From August 10 to the end of the month 
outrages spread in the directions of Char- 
leroi and Malines. There is a certain sig- 
nificance in the fact that the outrages 
round Liege coincide with the unexpected 
resistance of the Belgian Army in that 
district, and that the slaughter from 
August 19 to the end of the month is con- 
temporaneous with the period when the 
German army's need for a quick passage 
through Belgium at all costs was deemed 
imperative." — Bryce Committee. 

Q. — Did German soldiers really re- 
cord many of the facts in their 
diaries? 

A. — The German army authorities en- 
couraged the soldiers to keep diaries and 
among those that fell into the hands of 
their captors were hundreds which had 
everything set down with detailed accu- 
racy. 

Q. — Were the German counter- 
charges ever proved? 

A. — The Belgians denied them indig- 
nantly. The German Socialist newspaper 
Vorwaerts said in October 22, 1914, that 
"whenever inquiries have been made in 
regard to these reports, their absolute fal- 
sity has been demonstrated." The news- 
paper quotes the medical officer of the 
Gross Lichterfelde field hospital as say- 
ing: "Happily there is no truth whatever 
in these stories" — told by the Germans. 



325 



326 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Did civilians suffer from the 
very beginning? 

A. — "On August 4 the roads converging 
upon Liege from northeast, east, and 
south were covered with German Death's 
Head Hussars and Uhlans pressing for- 
ward to seize the passage over the Meuse. 
From the very beginning of the opera- 
tions the civilian population of villages 
on the line of German advance were made 
to experience the extreme horrors of war. 
'On the 4th of August,' says one witness, 
'at Herve' (a village not far from the 
frontier), 'I saw at about 2 o'clock five 
Uhlans, followed by a German officer and 
some soldiers in a motor car, call out 
to a couple of young fellows about 30 
yards away. The young men, being 
afraid, ran off and the Germans fired 

and killed one of them named D .' 

The murder of this innocent fugitive 
civilian was a prelude to the burning and 
pillage of Herve and of other villages in 
the neighborhood, to the indiscriminate 
shooting of civilians of both sexes, and 
to the organized military execution of 
batches of selected males. At Herve 
some 50 men escaping from the burning 
houses were seized, taken outside the 
town and shot. At Melen, a hamlet west 
of Herve, 40 men were shot. In one 
household _ alone the father and mother 
(names given) were shot, the daughter 
died after being repeatedy outraged, and 
the son was wounded. Nor were children 
exempt. 'About August 4,' says one wit- 
ness, 'near Vottem, we were pursuing 
some Uhlans. I saw a man, woman, and 
a girl about nine, who had been killed. 
They were on the threshold of a house, 
one on the top of the other, as if they 
had been shot down, one after the other, 
as they tried to escape.'" — Bryce Com- 
mittee. 

Q. — Were many villages thus de- 
stroyed on the way to Liege? 

A.— "On August 6 (1914), Battice- was 
destroyed in part. From the 8th to the 
10th over 300 houses were burnt at Herve, 
while mounted men shot into doors and 
windows to prevent escape of inhabitants. 

"At Heure le Romain on or about the 
15th of August all the male inhabitants, 
including some bedridden old men were 
imprisoned in the church. The burgomas- 
ter's brother and the priest were bay- 
oneted. 

"On or about the 14th and 15th the vil- 
lage of Vise was completely destroyed. 
Officers directed the incendiaries, who 
worked methodically with benzine. An- 
tiques and china were removed from the 



houses, before their destruction, by of- 
ficers, who guarded the plunder revolver 
in hand. The house of a witness, which 
contained valuables of this kind, was pro- 
tected for a time by a notice posted on 
the door by officers. This notice has been 
produced to the Committee. After the 
removal of the valuables this house also 
was burnt. 

"German soldiers had arrived on the 
15th at Blegny Trembleur and seized a 
quantity of wine. On the 16th prisoners 
were taken ; four, including the priest and 
the burgomaster, were shot. On the same 
day 200 (so-called) hostages were seized 
at Flemalle and marched off. There they 
were told that unless Fort Flemalle sur- 
rendered by noon they would be shot. It 
did surrender and they were released." — 
Bryce Committee. 

Q. — What happened at Liege? 

A. — The Bryce Committee reports : "A 
proclamation by General Kolewe gave the 
German version, that his troops had been 
fired on by Russian students. A captured 
German diary states that in the night of 
August 20 (1914) the inhabitants of Liege 
became mutinous and that 50 were shot. 
Belgian witnesses deny that there had 
been any provocation, some stating that 
many German soldiers were drunk, others 
giving evidence which indicates that the 
affair was planned beforehand. Though 
the cause is in dispute, the results are 
known with certainty. The Rue des Pit- 
teurs and houses in the Place de l'Univer- 
site and the Quai des Pecheurs were fired 
with benzine, and many inhabitants were 
burnt alive, their efforts to escape being 
prevented by rifle _ fire. Twenty people 
were shot while trying to escape. . . . The 
fire burnt through the night and the mur- 
ders continued on the following day. 
Thirty-two civilians were killed on that 
day in the Place de l'Universite alone, 
and a witness states that this was followed 
by the rape in open day of 15 or 20 women 
in the square itself." 

Q. — Did the Germans use hostages 
in their advance? 

A. — "August 22 Uhlans reached Mon- 
tigny-sur-Sambre. On a hill nearby were 
a detachment of French about 150 to 200 
strong. At about 1 .-30 the main body of 
the German army began to arrive. March- 
ing with them were two groups of so- 
called hostages, about 400 in all. Of these, 
300 were surrounded with a rope. The 
French troops opened fire, and immedi- 
ately the Germans commenced to destroy 
the town. Incendiaries with a distinctive 



Belgium's Long Torment 



327 



badge on their arm went down the main 
street with pastilles, and about 130 houses 
were destroyed in the main street. By 
10:30 p.m. some 200 more hostages had 
been collected. These were drawn from 
Alontigny itself, and on that night about 
50 men, women, and children were placed 
on the bridge over the Sambre and kept 
there all night. The bridge was similarly 
guarded for a day or two, apparently 
either from a fear that it was mined or in 
the belief that these men, women, and 
children would afford some protection to 
the Germans in the event of the French 
attempting to storm the bridge. At one 
period of the German occupation of Mon- 
tigny, eight nuns of the Order of Ste. 
Marie were captives on the bridge. House 
burning was accompanied by murder, and 
on Monday morning 27 civilians from one 
parish alone were seen lying dead in the 
hospital." — Bryce Committee. 

Q. — Was Andenne destroyed on the 
the same day? 

A. — Yes. Andenne on the Meuse was 
occupied by German troops whose com- 
mander pretended that the population had 
fired on them. Witnesses claim that the 
firing came from French soldiers holding 
the opposite bank. Four hundred people 
are said to have been killed there on Au- 
gust 20 and 21 (1914). 

Q. — Do the Germans admit the 
killings in Andenne? 

A. — Yes. They posted a proclamation 
which, after making the usual show of 
pretenses that the Belgian civilians had 
attacked German soldiers, goes on to the 
following brutal admission : 

"With my authorisation, the general 
commanding these troops has reduced the 
town to ashes and has had one hundred 
and ten persons shot. 

"I bring this fact to the knowledge of 
the people of Liege in order that they may 
know what fate to expect should they 
adopt a similar attitude. 

"Liege, 22d August, 1914. 

"General von Bulow." 

Q. — When did the German army 
enter Louvain? 

A.— On August 15, 1914. Hostages 
were selected from the notables of the 
city, among them the burgomaster, the 
rector of the University, the provincial 
councillor, aldermen, etc. The walls were 
at once placarded with notices which the 
army carried, saying that "in case a single 
arm be found, no matter in what house, 



or any hostility be committed against our 
troops, our transports, our telegraph-lines, 
our railways, or if any one harbors franc- 
tireurs, the culpable and the hostages will 
be shot without mercy. In addition, all 
the inhabitants of the villages in question 
will be driven out ; the villages and even 
cities will be demolished and burned. If 
this happens on the route of communica- 
tion between two villages the same meth- 
ods will be applied to the inhabitants of 
both." 

Q. — What are f ranctireurs ? 

A. — The term is a survival of the 
Franco-Prussian War, and describes a 
civilian or other person not attached to 
regularly recognized troops who takes to 
arms or attacks an occupying army. 

Q. — When was Louvain destroyed ? 

A. — The destruction began in the eve- 
ning of August 25 (1914), and continued 
through the 26th and 27th. 

Q. — Was there any fighting in Lou- 
vain? 

A. — "For six days (August 19-25) the 
Germans were in peaceful occupation. No 
houses were set on fire — no citizens killed. 
There was a certain amount of looting of 
empty houses, but otherwise discipline was 
effectively maintained. The condition of 
Louvain during these days was one of 
relative peace and quietude." — Bryce 
Committee. 

Q. — When did the Louvain destruc- 
tion begin? 

A. — "On the evening of August 25 a sud- 
den change takes place. The Germans, on 
that day repulsed by the Belgians, had 
re-occupied Louvain. Immediately the 
devastation and the holocaust; of its popu- 
lation commences. The inference is irre- 
sistible that the army as a whole wreaked 
its vengeance for the setback. . . . The 
depositions are numerous, and are be- 
lieved by the Committee to present a true 
and fairly complete picture of the events. 
We find no grounds for thinking that 
the inhabitants fired upon the German 
army. Eye-witnesses worthy of credence 
detail exactly when, where, and how the 
firing commenced. Such firing was by 
Germans on Germans. No impartial tri- 
bunal could, in our opinion, come to any 
other conclusion. 

"On the evening of the 25th firing could 
be heard in the direction of Herent, some 
three kilometers from Louvain. An alarm 



328 



Questions and Answers 



was sounded in the city. There was dis- 
order and confusion, and at 8 o'clock 
horses attached to baggage wagons stam- 
peded in the street and rifle fire com- 
menced. This was ir the Rue de la Sta- 
tion and came from the German police 
guard (21 in number), who, seeing the 
troops arrive in disorder, thought it was 
the enemy Then the corps of incendiaries 
go* to work. They had broad belts with 
the words 'Gctt mit tins' and their equip- 
ment consisted of a hatchet, a syringe, a 
smai! shovel and a revolver. Fires blazed 
up in the direction of the Law Courts, 
St Martin'.- Barracks and later in the 
Piace de la Station. Meanwhile an in- 
cessant fusillade was kept up on the win- 
dow ot the houses." — Bryce Committee. 

Q. — When were Louvain Library 
and University burned? 

A. — On August 26, 1914. The Univer- 
sity with its library, the Church of St. 
Peter, and many houses were burned on 
that day At the same time Herent, a 
village of 5,000 inhabitants not far away, 
was completely burned. 

Q.— Did not our official representa- 
tives visit Louvain? 

^ A. — On August 28 Secretary of Lega- 
tion Gibson, a Red Cross representative, 
and the Swedish Charge d'Affaires went 
to Louvain. There still were some houses 
burning. As Brand Whitlock reports it: 
"While they were standing in the Rue de 
la Station talking to a German officer, 
shots were suddenly fired and the German 
officer led them to the railway station 
where for half an hour they took refuge in 
the freight-depot. During all that time 
they could hear firing outside. The Ger- 
mans claimed that they were being fired 
upon bv Belgian civilians from the upper 
windows of houses in the Rue de la Sta- 
tion, but the Belgians of Louvain always 
insisted that the firing from the upper 
windows was done by German soldiers 
placed there for the purpose of impressing 
the diplomatic representatives of neutral 
powers." 

Q. — How many people were killed 
in Louvain? 

A. — The figures given by Brand Whit- 
lock are: 210 of both sexes and all ages, 
from infants of three months to persons 
of eighty years. Several thousand were 
arrested. More than six hundred, of 
whom a hundred were women and chil- 
dren, were deported to Germany. 



Q. — Is it true that children were 
wantonly killed? 

A. — "It is clearly shown that many of- 
fenses were committed against infants 
and quite young children. On one occa- 
sion children were even roped together 
and used as a military screen against the 
enemy, on another three soldiers went 
into action carrying small children to pro- 
tect themselves from flank fire. A shock- 
ing case of the murder of a baby by a 
drunken soldier at Malines is thus re- 
corded by one eye-witness and confirmed 
by another: — 

" 'I saw eight German soldiers, and they 
were drunk. They were singing and mak- 
ing a lot of noise and dancing about. As 
the German soldiers came along the street 
I saw a small child, whether boy or girl I 
could not see, come out of a house. The 
child was about two years of age. The 
child came into the middle of the street 
so as to be in the way of the soldiers. 
. . . One stepped aside and drove his bay- 
onet with both hands into the child's 
stomach, lifting the child into the air on 
his bayonet and carrying it away on his 
bayonet, he and his comrades still sing- 
ing.' " — Bryce Committee. 

Q. — Were officers equally cruel? 

A. — "An incident has been recorded 
which discloses the fact that even sober 
and highly-placed officers were not al- 
ways disposed to place a high value on 
child life. Thus the General, wishing to 
be conducted to the Town Hall at Leb- 
beke, remarked in French to his guide, 
who was accompanied by a small boy: 'If 
you do not show me the right way I will 
shoot you and your boy.' There was_ no 
need to carry the threat into execution, 
but that the threat should have been made 
is significant.'" — Bryce Committee. 

Q. — When was the priest of Gel- 
rode shot? 

A. — "In Aerschot fresh prisoners seem 
to have been added to those already in 
the church, since it would appear that 
prisoners were kept to some extent in the 
church during the whole of German occu- 
pation. The second occasion on which 
large numbers were put there was shortly 
after the battle of Malines, and it was 
then that the priest of Gelrode was 
brought to Aerschot church, treated abom- 
inably and finally murdered. . . . Some 
were actually kept there until the arrival 
of the Belgian army, on September nth. 
Others were marched to Louvain, eventu- 
ally merged with other prisoners and 



Belgium's Long Torment 



329 



taken to Germany and elsewhere. It is 
said by one witness that about 1,500 were 
marched to Louvain, and that the journey 
took six hours. 'We were all marched off 
to Louvain, walking. There were some 
very old people, amongst others a man 
90 years of age. The very old people 
were drawn in carts and barrows by the 
younger men. There was an officer with 
a bicycle, who shouted, as people fell out 
by the side of the road, "shoot them." ' 
— Bryce Committee. 

Q. — What two forms of violence 
were especially significant? 
A. — "Two classes of murders require 
special mention, because one is almost 
new, and the other altogether unprece- 
dented. The former is the seizure of 
peaceful citizens as so-called hostages for 
the conduct of the civil population, to 
secure some military advantage, or to 
compel payment of a contribution, the 
hostages being shot if the condition is not 
fulfilled. Such hostage taking, with the 
penalty of death attached, has now and 
then happened, . . . but it is opposed both 
to the rules of war and to every prin- 
ciple of justice and humanity. The other 
is killing innocent inhabitants of a village, 
because shots have been fired, or are al- 
leged to have been fired, on the troops 
by someone in the village. For this prac- 
tice no previous example and no justifica- 
tion has been or can be pleaded. . . . 
Large bodies of men, sometimes includ- 
ing the burgomaster and the priest, were 
marched to a spot chosen for the purpose, 
and there shot in cold blood, without any 
attempt at trial or even inquiry, under 
the pretense of inflicting punishment upon 
the village, though these unhappy victims 
were not even charged with having them- 
selves committed any wrongful act, and 
though, in some cases at least, the village 
authorities had done all in their power to 
prevent any molestation of the invading 
force. Such acts are no part of war, for 
innocence is entitled to respect even in 
war. They are mere murders, just as the 
drowning of the innocent passengers and 
crews on a merchant ship is murder and 
not an act of war." — Bryce Committee. 

Q. — Were civilians actually used as 
screens ? 

A. — There were many instances in 
which children and sometimes military 
prisoners were used as screens from be- 
hind which the Germans could fire on Bel- 
gian troops in the hope that the Belgians 
would not return the fire for fear of 
killing their own fellow countrymen. 

Outside Fort Fleron, near Liege, men 



and children were marched in front of 
Germans to prevent Belgian soldiers from 
firing. On August 22d, half a dozen 
Belgian colliers were marching in front 
of German troops who were pursuing the 
English at Mons, and in the opinion of the 
witnesses they must have been placed 
there intentionally. On August 24th, men, 
women, and children were pushed into the 
front of the German position outside 
Mons. A witness told of 16 to 20 women, 
about a dozen children, and half a dozen 
men. Other incidents are mentioned as 
occurring at Malines, Eppeghem, Londer- 
zeel, Termonde, Tournai, etc. 

Q. — When was Namur burned? 

A. — On August 27. The Germans had 
entered Namur August 22, 1914. They 
put it under a rule of terror proclaiming 
that its existence depended upon complete 
absence of "criminal acts against the Ger- 
man army." On August 27 the soldiers 
began to burn the town. The City 
Hall and the buildings along a number 
of avenues were destroyed. Namur paid 
a contribution of 32 million francs 
($6,140,000), and it is said that this alone 
saved it from the fate of Dinant and 
Louvain. 

Q. — What was the deportation de- 
cree? 

A. — It was a decree signed by Quarter- 
master General Sauberzweig, Great Head- 
quarters, October 3, 1916, bearing the ab- 
surd title of "Decree concerning limiting 
the burdens on public charity." It de- 
clared : (1) people able to work may be 
compelled to work outside of the place 
where they live, if they are dependent on 
charity for support of themselves or their 
dependents, because of gambling, drunken- 
ness, loafing, unemployment or idleness ; 

(2) every inhabitant is bound to give 
assistance in cases of general danger, etc., 
even outside of the place where he lives ; 

(3) whoever refuses to work when called 
incurs imprisonment up to 3 years or a 
fine up to 10,000 marks. 

Q. — Had the Belgians been com- 
pelled previously to work for 
the Germans? 

A. — Yes. A year before (October 12, 
1915) there was issued a decree that: (1) 
Whoever without reason refuses work 
suitable to his occupation, and in the exe- 
cution of which the military administra- 
tion is interested, will be liable to im- 
prisonment not exceeding one year. He 
may also be transported to Germany. In- 
voking Belgian laws or international con- 
ventions can in no case justify refusal to 



330 



Questions and Answers 



work. On the lawfulness of the work, 
the military commandant has the sole right 
of decision. (2) Any person who at- 
tempts to influence another to refuse work 
is liable to imprisonment not exceeding 
five years. (3) Whoever knowingly abets 
a punishable refusal to .work, will incur a 
maximum fine" of 10,000 marks, and may 
be condemned to a year's imprisonment. 
If communes or associations have ren- 
dered themselves guilty of such offence 
the heads of the communes will be pun- 
ished. (4) In addition, the German au- 
thorities may impose fines or coercive 
police measures on such communes. 

Q. — Was this 191 5 decree the one 
that Cardinal Mercier styled 
slavery? 

A. — He said concerning it : "The injus- 
tice and arbitrariness of/ this decree ex- 
ceed all that could be imagined. Forced 
labor, collective penalties and arbitrary 
punishments, all are there. It is slavery, 
neither more nor less." 

Q. — What instances did Cardinal 
Mercier cite? 

A.— He and his colleagues declared that 
workmen had been forced to labor or had 
been punished for refusal, citing the fol- 
lowing cases: April 27 (1915). 200 work- 
men forced by soldiers to work in Luttre 
arsenal; May 4, 24 workmen imprisoned 
at Nivelles ; May 8, 25 sent to Germany ; 
May 14, 45 sent to Germany; May 22, 104 
sent toward Charleroi ; May 30, Malines 
punished by cessation of all commercial 
traffic because 500 workmen had refused 
to work at the arsenal; commune of 
Sweveghem punished, June, because 350 
workmen refused to make barbed-wire for 
the army; Harlebeke, October, 29 sent to 
Germany. Mons, directors, foremen and 
81 men imprisoned for refusing to work 
for the German army. 

Q. — What was the origin of the 
forced labor issue? 
A. — It is explained as follows by Brand 
Whitlock, American Minister to Belgium, 
in a report to the State Department (Jan- 
uary 16, 1917) : "At the time we were 
organizing the relief work (autumn 1914). 
the Comite National— the Belgian relief 
organization that collaborates with the 
Commission for Relief in Belgium— pro- 
posed an arrangement by which the Bel- 
gian Government should pay to its own 
employees left in Belgium, and other un- 
employed men besides, the wages they had 
been accustomed to receive. The Belgians 



wished to do this both for humanitarian 
and patriotic purposes ; they wished to 
provide the unemployed with the means of 
livelihood, and, at the same time, to pre- 
vent their working for the Germans. I 
refused tq be connected in any way with 
this plan, and told the Belgian committee 
that it had many possibilities of danger; 
that not only would it place a premium on 
idleness, but that it would ultimately ex- 
asperate the Germans. However, the 
policy was adopted, and has been con- 
tinued in practice, and on the rolls of the 
Comite National have been borne the 
names of hundreds of thousands — some 
700,000, I believe — of idle men receiving 
this dole, distributed through the com- 
munes." 

Q. — Did the Germans resent this? 

A. — "The presence of these unemployed, 
however, was a constant temptation to 
German cupidity. Many times they sought 
to obtain the lists of the chomeurs, but 
were always foiled by the claim that under 
the guarantees covering the relief work, 
the records of the Comite National and 
its various suborganizations were immune. 
Rather than risk any interruption of the 
ravitaillement, . . . the authorities never 
pressed the point, other than with the 
burgomasters of the communes." — Brand 
Whitlock. 

Q. — Who finally put the labor co- 
ercion into effect? 

A. — Mr. Whitlock says : "Finally, how- 
ever, the military party, always brutal, and 
with an astounding ignorance of public 
opinion and of moral sentiment, deter- 
mined to put these idle men to work." 

Q. — What happened after the de- 
portation decree? 

A. — A vast outburst of grief and indig- 
nation all over the world. In Belgium the 
agony and rage exceeded even the emotion 
that had been _ caused by the invasion. 
Communes, societies, the women of Bel- 
gium and Cardinal Mercier addressed 
touching petitions and remonstrances to 
the military authorities. 

Q. — What did Cardinal Mercier 

say? 

A.— He pointed out first that the prom- 
ise of the Governor of Antwerp had been 
subsequently confirmed to him uncondi- 
tionally by the Governor General, von der 
Goltz. Secondly, he said that the occupy- 
ing authorities had suppressed national 



Belgium's Long Torment 



33* 



labor by seizing and shipping to Germany- 
raw material, machinery, tools and metals 
of factories. Third, that England would 
allow raw materials to enter Belgium if 
the authorities were willing to leave them 
to Belgian industry and would agree not 
to seize the finished products. He em- 
phasized the burning point that every 
Belgian who worked for Germany would 
free a German worker for the German 
army. 

Q. — Did the United States inter- 
vene? 

A. — American Embassy officials inter- 
vened in Berlin and obtained some ameli- 
orations, such as: (i) only actual unem- 
ployed to be taken ; (2) selections to be 
made carefully; (3) deported persons to 
be permitted communication with their 
families ; (4) places of work to be open to 
inspection by Spanish representatives 
(Spain representing Belgium in Berlin) ; 
(5) American inspection to be arranged 
informally if desired. 

Q. — Did the United States protest 
formally ? 

A. — Yes. On December 5. 1916, the 
United States laid a formal protest before 
the Imperial Chancellor, saying that the 
American government was constrained to 
"protest in a friendly spirit but most sol- 
emnly against this action which is in con- 
travention of all precedent and those hu- 
mane principles of international practice 
which have long been accepted and fol- 
lowed by civilized nations in their treat- 
ment of non-combatants in conquered ter- 
ritory." 

Q. — Did other nations protest? 

A. — Spain and Switzerland protested, as 
did the Pope. Socialist members of the 
German Reichstag added their unqualified 
censure. 

Q. — How many Belgians were de- 
ported? 

A. — Mr. Whitlock's report of January 
16, 1917, was that so far as he had been 
able to determine, about 100,000 had been 
deported and less than 2,000 had been re- 
turned. Unofficial estimates have been as 
high as 300,000 (See under "Ravaged 
Belgium.") 

Q. — What was the moral effect of 
the deportations? 

A.— Brand Whitlock reported that the 
Germans had dealt a mortal blow at their 
own chances of being tolerated. He said : 



"It is conceivable that the Flemish popu- 
lation might have existed under German 
rule; it was Teutonic in its origin and 
anti-French always. But now the Ger- 
mans have changed all that." Until the 
deportations, the Flemings and the Ger- 
mans had apparently gotten along peace- 
fully. "The old Germans of the Land- 
sturm had been quartered in Flemish 
homes. They got along fairly well. They 
helped the women with their work." 

Q. — What words did he use? 

A. — He said that the deportation decree 
was one "of those deeds that make one 
despair of the future of the human race, 
a deed coldly planned, studiously matured, 
and deliberately and systematically exe- 
cuted, a deed so cruel that German sol- 
diers are said to have wept in its execu- 
tion, and so monstrous that even German 
officers are now said to be ashamed." 

Q. — Were there deportations in 
France too? 

A. — Yes. People were taken from 
Lille, and many other towns and villages 
to work in the country, largely in the 
Ardennes. Between 20,000 and 30,000 
were thus sent away and the tragedy was 
frightfully increased by the fact that many 
young girls were thus deported. Deporta- 
tions also were conducted in Poland. 

Q. — How did the military machine 
gradually take over Belgium? 

A. — Under von Bissing successive de- 
crees announced : that the powers apper- 
taining to the King of the Belgians would 
be exercised by the Military Governor- 
General; the powers appertaining to the 
Provincial Governors in Belgium would be 
exercised by Military Governors of the 
Provinces ; that the roles of Commission- 
ers of Arrondissements would be filled by 
"Kreischefs" (Chiefs of Districts), etc. 
On February 5, 1915, von Bissing issued a 
decree defining the powers of Governors, 
of Chefs of Arrondissements, etc., and 
in Article 9 of the decree stated that he 
reserved to himself the unlimited right to 
issue such decrees, ordinances and orders, 
and to take such repressive or disciplinary 
measures as he considered necessary. 

Q. — Were many people persecuted 
by these courts martial? 

A. — Mr. Whitlock says that in one year 
more than 600,000 persons were condemned 
to pay fines or to serve in prison, or con- 
demned to hard labor, deportation or 
death. 



332 



Questions and Answers 



Q. — Why did the Germans arrest 
the Princess de Croy? 

A. — They pretended she had aided fugi- 
tive British soldiers to pass the Belgian 
frontier. At the beginning of the war 
she, with the Countess Jeanne de Belle- 
ville, had established a Red Cross hospital 
in her chateau near Mons, where Belgian, 
English and German wounded were cared 
for. The two ladies were of the oldest 
Belgian families and universally respected 
and beloved. Their arrest, early in Au- 
gust, 191 5, cast an additional black cloud 
of sorrow over Belgium. 
Q. — What had these two ladies 
done? 

A.— Brand Whitlock, in his narrative 
"Belgium," says: "After the battle of 
Mons a great many British soldiers, cut 
off in the retreat, had been left behind in 
Belgium, and under terrible difficulties 
and hardships all through winter and 
spring, had lived the lives of hunted ani- 
mals in the woods or in the farms of 
Hainault and Brabant. Near the chateau 
of the Princess de Croy thirteen British 
soldiers had hidden in a haystack on a 
Belgian farm and, tracked down at last 
by German soldiers, they were taken, 
stood against the wall and shot without 
mercy. This atrocity so affected the 
Princess that she determined to organize 
a method whereby British soldiers who, 
finding themselves in a position that in all 
civilized countries would have entitled 
them at least to the consideration shown 
to prisoners of war, could be cared for 
and if possible got out of the country. 
And though frail and in delicate health, 
she and the Countess de Belleville and 
Madame Thuiliez and certain others or- 
ganized a system to aid British soldiers 
who were still hiding and to send them to 
Brussels where, as she declared in her in- 
terrogatory before the military tribunal, 
she thought they would be less rigorously 
dealt with than near Mons, which was 
under the military regime, whereas Brus- 
sels was in the territory of the General 
Government. The Princess declared that 
she did not know what became of them 
after they reached Brussels. There, how- 
ever, others aided them to get across the 
frontier into Holland." 

Q. — Was Edith Cavell arrested at 
the same time? 
A. — Yes. She was arrested on August 
5, IQI5- 

Q. — Was the Princess de Croy tried 
with Edith Cavell? 
A. — The Princess de Croy, the Coun- 



tess de Belleville, Edith Cavell, and thirty- 
two others were tried together on Octo- 
ber 7, 1915, in secret session, and only the 
barest facts of that monstrous piece of 
injustice have ever reached the outer 
world. Of the thirty-five, twenty-six 
were condemned — Edith Cavell, the Coun- 
tess de Belleville, Madame Louis Thuiliez, 
a Lille school teacher, Phillipe Bancq, a 
Brussels architect, Louis Severin, a Brus- 
sels druggist, and Albert Libiez, a Mons 
lawyer, being condemned to death ; the 
Princess de Croy, Mrs. Ada Bodart of 
Brussels, Harman Capiau, a Wasmes civil 
engineer, and Georges Derveau, a Patur- 
gas pharmacist, being sentenced to 15 
years' penal servitude at hard labor ; sev- 
enteen others sentenced to from two to 
five years' imprisonment ; eight acquitted. 

Q. — Were the death-sentences car- 
ried out? 

A. — Phillipe Bancq was shot at the 
same time as Edith Cavell. The President 
of the United States and the King of 
Spain protested to Berlin and the sen- 
tences of the Countess de __ Belleville, 
Madame Thuiliez, Louis Severin and Al- 
bert Liebiez were commuted to imprison- 
ment. As Mr. Whitlock says: "The 
thirst for blood had been slaked. . . . The 
storm of universal loathing and reproba- 
tion for the deed was too much even for 
the Germans." 

Q. — Were the German military 
courts conducted at all like 
other courts? 

A. — No. There were no written charges 
or specifications. The German officers 
sitting as judges, received what the "secret 
police" laid before them, and did not per- 
mit the accused to cross-examine these 
witnesses. An accused person could not 
call witnesses and even voluntary wit- 
nesses had no right to be heard. The law- 
yer for an accused person had no oppor- 
tunity to prepare a case, and whatever 
argument he might make had to be care- 
fully framed to avoid criticism of German 
soldiers or witnesses for the court. 

Q. — What did our Minister at 
Brussels say of this system of 
inquiry? 
A. — "For one of our Anglo-Saxon race 
and legal traditions to understand condi- 
tions in Belgium during the German occu- 
pation it is necessary to banish resolutely 
from the mind every conception of right 
we have inherited from our ancestors, 
conceptions long since crystallized into 
immutable principles of law and con- 



Belgium's Long Torment 



333 



firmed in our charters of liberty. In the 
German mentality these conceptions do 
not exist; they think in other sequences, 
they act according to another principle, if 
it is a principle, the conviction that there 
is only one right, one privilege, and that 
it belongs exclusively to Germany, the 
right, namely, to do whatever they have 
the physical force to do." — Brand Whit- 
lock in "Belgium." 

Q. — Did the accused have no rights 
before them at all? 

A. — "These so-called courts, of whose 
irresponsible and brutal nature I have 
tried to convey some notion, were mere 
inquisitorial bodies, guided by no prin- 
ciple save that of interest in their own 
bloody nature ; they did as they pleased 
and would have scorned a Jeffreys as 
too lenient, a Lynch as too formal, a 
Spanish auto da fe as too technical and a 
tribunal of the French Revolution as soft 
and sentimental. Before them the accused 
had literally no rights, not even to present 
a defense, and if he was permitted to 
speak in his own behalf it was only as a 
generous and liberal favor." — Brand 
Whitlock in "Belgium." 

Q. — What could a lawyer do for 
the defense? 

A. — In the chapter on "The Execution 
of Edith Cavell" in his book "Belgium," 
Mr. Whitlock says : 

"The defense was not a defense in our 
meaning of the word. The lawyer was 
not allowed to see his client before he 
appeared to plead the case before the 
court where the accused was arraigned 
for trial, and he was not permitted to 
speak to his client during the trial ; often 
he did not know what the accusation was 
until the trial began, and sometimes he 
did not know it even then." 

Q. — Was there not a grim connec- 
tion between the murder of 
Edith Cavell and the "Lusi- 
tania" horror? 

A. — There was a grim coincidence. 
The school of graduate nurses in Brussels 
which Edith Cavell was foremost in con- 
ducting had been established by the co- 
operation of earnest Belgian citizens, fore- 
most of whom were Dr. Depage, one of 
the leading physicians of Belgium, and 
his wife. The building was completed in 
the very month of the Lusitania sinking 
(May, 191 5) and among the victims of 
that atrocity was Madame Depage. 



Q.— What was the text of the Ger- 
man ultimatum to Belgium? 

A. — It opened with the famous lie that 
Germany had reliable information of 
French intention to march through Bel- 
gium against Germany and made the fol- 
lowing proposals in return for being 
permitted unhindered crossing of Belgian 
territory: (1) to guarantee territory and 
independence of Belgium in full; (2) to 
evacuate Belgian territory on the conclu- 
sion of peace; (3) to purchase supplies 
for cash and pay for all damage done by 
German troops. If these proposals were 
rejected, and Belgium opposed difficulties 
to German troops, said the ultimatum, 
Germany would be compelled to view Bel- 
gium as an enemy. 

Q. — What was the Belgian reply? 

A. — The Belgian reply said that France 
had formally declared that she would not 
violate Belgian neutrality and that if she 
did, Belgian troops would resist. After 
calling attention to the treaty guarantee- 
ing her neutrality, the reply said in part : 

"Belgium has always been faithful to 
her international obligations; she has car- 
ried out her duties in a spirit of loyal im- 
partiality and she has left nothing undone 
to maintain respect for her neutrality. . . . 
Conscious of the part which Belgium has 
played for more than eighty years in the 
civilisation of the world, they refuse to 
believe that the independence of Belgium 
can only be preserved at the price of the 
violation of her neutrality. 

"If this hope is disappointed the Bel- 
gian Government are firmly resolved to 
repel, by all means in their power, every 
attack upon their rights." 

Q. — When was this reply made ? 

A. — It was dated August 3, 1914, 7 
a.m., that being the end of the twelve- 
hour period named in the German ulti- 
matum. 

Q. — What was the Proclamation to 
the Belgian army? 

A.— On August 5, 1914, King Albert of 
Belgium addressed the army thus : 

^ "TO THE NATIONAL ARMY! 
"Soldiers : 

"Without the least provocation on our 
part, a neighbor, glorying in his power, has 
torn into shreds the treaties that bear his 
signature and violated the territory of 
our fathers. . . . Ccesar said of your an- 
cestors: 'Of all the peoples of Gaul the 
Belgians are the bravest.' Hail to you, 



334 



Questions and Answers 



army of the Belgian people! In the face 
of the enemy, remember that you are 
fighting for liberty and for your menaced 
hearths. Remember, men of Flanders, the 
Battle of the Golden Spurs; and you, 
Walloons, who now stand on your honor, 
remember the six hundred Franchimon- 
tois. 

"Soldiers! I leave Brussels to put my- 
self at your head." 

Albert. 

Q. — Where did the King take the 
field? 

A. — At Louvain, a famous old town in 
the plain about 15 miles east of Brussels, 
facing the German advance from the fron- 
tier toward the capital. 

Q. — Were many German citizens 
in Belgium when war began? 

A. — Brand Whitlock says that there 
were nearly 5,000 assembled in Brussels 
alone. They were placed on trains and 
sent to Germany through Holland. 

Q. — How were they treated by the 
Belgians? 

A. — Mr. Whitlock's words are: 
"The action of the Belgian Government 
in this emergency was superb in spirit 
and in execution and the population nobly 
generous. Not a German was injured 
during those days, and no more serious 
harm was done than that resulting from 
the breaking of windows in the first ebul- 
lition of excitement. The Burgomaster 
of Brussels, M. Adolphe Max, issued a 
proclamation appealing to the population 
to remain calm, while the Minister of the 
Interior published a statement explaining 
the laws and customs of war." 

Q. — What was the first notice 
served on Brussels by the in- 
vaders ? 

A. — One of the first placards posted 
(perhaps the first) was the following: 

PROCLAMATION 

Brussels, August 20, 1014. 

"German troops will pass through Brus- 
sels to-day and the following days, and 
will be obliged by circumstances to call 
upon the city for lodging, food, and sup- 
plies. All these requirements will be set- 
tled for regularly through the communal 
authorities. 

"I expect the population to meet these 



necessities of war without resistance, and 
especially that there shall be no aggression 
against our troops, and that the supplies 
required shall be promptly furnished. 

"In this case I give every guarantee for 
the preservation of the city and the safety 
of its inhabitants. 

"If, however, as has unfortunately hap- 
pened in other places, there are attacks 
upon our troops, firing upon our soldiers, 
fires or explosions of any sort, I shall be 
obliged to take the severest measures. 

"The General Commanding the Army 
Corps, 

"Sixt Von Arnim." 

Q. — Who commanded the force 
that entered Brussels? 

A. — General Thaddeus von Jarotsky, 
Major-General, and Commander of the 
Sixteenth Infantry Brigade. 

Q. — Who succeeded General von 
Jarotsky in Brussels? 

A. — In a few days after the entry into 
Brussels he turned over his command to 
General the Baron Arthur von Liittwitz, 
who became German Military Governor 
in Brussels. It must be noted that this is 
a post different from that of "Governor- 
General in Belgium," which was estab- 
lished by the Germans to conduct the gen- 
eral administration of the entire occupied 
territory. 

Q. — Who was the first German 
Governor in Belgium ? 

A. — General von der Goltz, who organ- 
ized "the unspeakable Turk" for war. 

Q. — What was the first demand 
made of Brussels? 

A. — When the Burgomaster went to 
meet the Germans, they demanded as 
hostages the Burgomaster, the members 
of the Municipal Council and twenty no- 
tables. They demanded also a war contri- 
bution of 50 million francs ($9,500,000), 
and great quantities of food and forage. 

Q. — What were the details of this 
negotiation? 

A. — Burgomaster Max had told General 
von Jarotsky that he could not procure 
the entire sum of 50 million francs. He 
proposed that he would try to get l T A mil- 
lion down and within 8 days afterward 
i8]4 millions. He tried to get the whole 
contribution reduced to 20 millions, and 
von Jarotsky promised to use his influence 
to have this done. The contribution was 
finally reduced slightly — to 45 millions. 



Belgium's Long Torment 



335 



Q. — How was this money to be 
raised ? 

A. — It was to be raised by the various 
"communes" of Brussels. The "Agglome- 
ration brouxelloise" (which means practic- 
ally "Greater Brussels") is made up of 15 
communes, each with its own burgomas- 
ter. The burgomaster of the Commune of 
Brussels, that being the old historic Brus- 
sels, has always been considered the head 
of the whole city. These communes ar- 
ranged among themselves that the Com- 
mune of Brussels should pay 20 millions 
while the other communes raised 30 mil- 
lions pro rata to each commune accord- 
ing to population. 

Q. — Were the payments made? 

A. — The Commune of Brussels made its 
payments promptly and regularly, so that 
by September 30, 1914, it had only 4J/2 
million francs still to pay. The other 
communes, however, had failed to raise 
their quota of 30 millions, and the Com- 
mune of Brussels did not have enough 
funds to make the deficit good. 

Q. — What did the Germans do 
when the payments were not 
made? 

A. — They issued this official notice: 

"The German Government had ordered 
the cash payment of requisition, naturally 
believing that the city would voluntarily 
pay the whole of the forced payment 
(contribution de guerre) imposed upon it. 

"It was only this condition that could 
justify the favored treatment enjoyed by 
Brussels, as distinguished from the other 
cities of Belgium which will not have 
their requisition orders settled until after 
the conclusion of peace. 

"Inasmuch as the city administration 
of Brussels refuses to settle the remainder 
of the forced payment, from this day for- 
ward no requisition will be settled in cash 
by the Government treasury. 

"The Military Governor, 
"Baron von Luttwits, 
"Major-General." 

Brussels, September 26, 1914. 

Q. — What did the authorities of 
Brussels do? 

A. — Burgomaster Max instructed M. 
Dufaire, Director of the Deutsche Bank 
in Brussels, not to pay the certificates of 
indebtedness which the city had given to 
the German authorities to be collected 
September 30, adding that this was done 
in reply to the Governor-General's proc- 
lamation. 



Q. — How did the Germans respond 
to Max's action? 

A. — They ordered his arrest on Sep- 
tember 26, 1914, and posted the following 
placard in Brussels : 

"Notice — Burgomaster Max having 
failed to fulfil the engagements entered 
into with the German Government, I am 
forced to suspend him from fiis position. 
"Monsieur Max will be held in honor- 
able detention in a fortress. 

"The Military Governor, 
"Baron von Lilttwitz, 
"General." 
Brussels, September 26, 1914. 

He was sent to Namur and later to Ger- 
many. 

Q. — Did American officials try to 
save Max from arrest? 

A.— -Yes. Brand Whitlock and the 
Spanish Minister interceded with General 
von Liittwitz. The General said that he 
had no choice, as it was the third official 
difficulty they had had. He said that Max 
had become too popular and that "the pop- 
ularity had gone to his head." Brand 
Whitlock reports that he said: 

"I said this to him the other day: 'Mon- 
sieur Max, do you know what I think you 
are trying to do? I think you are trying 
to become the first president of the Bel- 
gian Republic!'" 

The three difficulties to which he re- 
ferred were a certain placard about the 
flags, another denying an assertion of the 
Commandant at Liege, and finally the or- 
der to the bank to cease payment of con- 
tributions. 

Q. — Had display of Belgian flags 
been prohibited in Brussels? 

A. — They had been flown without inter- 
ference for some weeks, but then the fol- 
lowing order was posted : 

"The population of Brussels, under- 
standing well its own interests, has 
generally, since the arrival of the Ger- 
man troops, maintained order and quiet. 
For this reason, I have not yet forbidden 
the display of Belgian flags, which is re- 
garded as a provocation by the German 
troops living in or passing through Brus- 
sels. Purely in order to avoid having our 
troops led to acting on their own initia- 
tive, I now call upon houseowners to take 
down their Belgian flags. 

"The Military Government, in putting 
this measure into effect, has not the slight- 
est intention of wounding the susceptibili- 
ties and dignity of the citizens. It is in- 



336 



Questions and Answers 



tended solely to protect the citizens against 
harm. 

"Baron von Luttwitz, 
General and Governor." 
Brussels, September 16, 1914. 

The burgomaster posted a placard at 
once, urging the people to obey; but the 
Germans pretended certain of his phrases 
were offensive, and Mr. Max was placed 
under arrest for a short period. 



Q. — What placard did Burgomas- 
ter Max post denying German 
assertions? 

A. — "Affiches," (meaning proclamations 
and bulletins) became a daily and im- 
portant part of the city's life. The 
Germans posted not only official orders, 
but accounts of battles and other news, 
which they wanted to speed. These 
placards were in three languages, Ger- 
man, French and Flemish. On August 
30, 1914, ten days after the German entry, 
Burgomaster Max created a sensation by 
causing a placard to be posted with the 
following : 



CITY OF BRUSSELS 

The German Governor of the City of 
Liige, Lieutenant-General von Kolewe, has 
caused to be published the following no- 
tice : 

"To the inhabitants of the City of Liege: 
"The Burgomaster of Brussels has in- 
formed the German Commander that the 
French Government has notified the Bel- 
gian Government of the impossibility of 
assisting it offensively in any manner in 
view of the fact that it finds itself com- 
pelled to take the defensive. 

"To this affirmative I oppose the most 
formal denial. 

"The Burgomaster, 
"Adolphe Max." 
Brussels, August 30, 1914. 



Q. — Did the Germans assume local 
government of Brussels after 
Max was removed? 

A. — No. Monsieur Lemmonier, a Brus- 
sels lawyer and ranking Alderman, was 
induced by Mr. Whitlock and the Spanish 
Minister to assume the position of Active 
Burgomaster, and General von Luttwitz 
announced that he wished the aldermen 



and the Brussels police to continue at 
their posts. 

Q. — When did von Bissing become 
Governor-General in Belgium? 

A. — In November, 1914. He succeeded 
General von der Goltz, who returned to 
Turkey. 

Q. — How old was von Bissing? 

A. — He was 70 years old and is de- 
scribed by Mr. Whitlock as "old and thin, 
with thick graying black hair brushed 
straight back from his forehead and plas- 
tered down as with water or with oil on 
the curiously shaped head that was so 
straight and sheer behind. His face was 
hard and its leathern skin, wrinkled and 
old and weather-beaten, was remorselessly 
shaved as to chin and throat and high 
lean cheeks, leaving the thick, heavy mus- 
tache of a Prussian Reiter to hide some- 
what the thin lips of the stern mouth and 
then flow on, growing across his cheeks 
to bristle up fiercely by his ears." 

Q. — What was von Bissing's first 
important act of authority? 

A. — It was a decree issued December 
10, imposing on the population of Belgium 
a contribution of war of 480 million 
francs ($92,640,000), for the year, payable 
monthly. 

Q. — How did this decree read? 

A. — "Order — There is imposed on the 
population of Belgium a war contribution 
amounting to forty million francs payable 
monthly for the period of a year. 

"The payment of these amounts is given 
in charge of the nine provinces, who are 
held as jointly and separately liable for it. 

"The two first monthly payments must 
be made not later than January 15, 1915, 
and the succeeding monthly payments not 
later than the tenth of each month fol- 
lowing, at the treasury office of the field 
army of the General Imperial Government 
in Brussels. 

"In cases where the provinces may have 
recourse to the issuing of obligations in 
order to procure the necessary funds, the 
form and tenure of the notes shall be 
determined by the General Imperial Com- 
missary for the banks of Belgium." 

Q. — Did this contribution include 
Brussels? 

A. — Yes, because Brussels is part of 
Belgium. The Brussels authorities pro- 



Belgium's Long Torment 



337 



tested on the ground that it thus made 
the 750,000 people of that city pay an ad- 
ditional contribution. 

Q. — Were other contributions laid 
on Brussels? 

A. — On January 16, 1915, the Governor- 
General imposed on those Belgians who 
had fled from the country a tax equiva- 
lent to ten times the regular personal tax. 
This, also, naturally took in citizens of 
Brussels who had fled. 

Q. — Were there fines in addition? 

A. — Brussels was fined 500,000 marks 
for refusing to repair the road between 
Brussels and Malines. There were many 
sums levied on the communes for dam- 
ages claimed to have been sustained by 
German citizens when war was declared. 
Mons was fined about $120,000 for viola- 
tion of news censorship. One of the 
heaviest fines was nearly a million dollars 
laid on Brussels early in the occupation. 

Q. — What was this heavy fine for? 

A. — Two Belgian policemen got into a 
fight with a German secret-service agent 
who, as they explained, had not said who 
he was. The result was that one police- 
,man was condemned to five years' and 
the other to three years' imprisonment, 
and the city of Brussels was "punished by 
an additional fine of Five Million Francs 
($965,000)." 

Q. — How much did Germany exact 
from Belgium altogether? 

A. — On August 6, 1918, Lord Robert 
Cecil, Assistant Secretary of State for 
Foreign Affairs, said during a speech in 
the House of Commons that altogether 
the Germans had levied war contributions 
of 2 billions, 330 millions francs on Bel- 
gium, not counting big fines that had been 
levied on communities, firms and indi- 
viduals. In American money this rep- 
resents $449,690,000. The total of Bel- 
gium's damages has not been exactly com- 
puted. The Belgian Government has es- 
timated damages of one billion 500 million 
but states that these do not represent the 
total of Belgium's material losses. 

Q. — How much did Brussels have 
to supply in provisions? 

A. — When the German army entered, 
Brussels had to supply daily about 10,- 
000 pounds wheat, 5,000 pounds sugar, and 
36,000 pounds oats. 



Q. — What did the Germans requi- 
sition elsewhere? 

m A. — In various places the recorded requi- 
sitions were: $50,000 (Louvain), and 
$800,000 (Malines) worth preserved vege- 
tables; Middleburg (850 inhabitants), 50 
cows, 185 pigs, 25,000 pounds oats, 50,000 
pounds wheat, 25,000 pounds beans, 75,000 
pounds straw. 

Q. — What was seized at Antwerp? 

A. — Oil-cake amounting to 40,000 tons ; 
3 million^ dollars' worth cereals; $800,000 
worth nitrate ; $400,000 oils ; $600,000 
worth petroleum; $1,200,000 worth wool; 
$4,000,000 worth copper ; $300,000 worth 
horse hair ; $250,000 worth wine. The fig- 
ures are roughly correct. The total of 
the Antwerp requisition is said to have 
been 16J/2 million dollars. 

Q. — When did Cardinal Mercier is- 
sue his famous pastoral letter? 

A. — It was issued from Malines on 
Christmas, 1914, and it was appointed to 
be read in all the Belgian churches on the 
first Sunday in January, 1915. 

Q. — What was this letter? 

A. — It was an exhortation to the people 
to be patient, though he made it plain 
that the governing powers then in the 
land were not there by right and that 
their authority was only temporary. It 
enumerated the wrongs that had been done 
to Belgium. The letter was one of the 
most impressive utterances that had been 
made in the occupied country, and it im- 
pressed and touched the entire world 
deeply. 

Q. — What did he say of Belgium's 
sufferings? 

A. — "By thousands have our brave ones 
been mown down ; wives, mothers, are 
weeping for those they shall not see again ; 
hearths are desolate ; dire poverty spreads, 
anguish becomes more bitter. At Malines, 
at Antwerp, the people of two great cities 
have been given over, the one for six 
hours, the other for thirty-four hours of 
continuous bombardment, to the throes of 
death. I have traversed the greater part 
of the districts most terribly devastated in 
my diocese and the ruins I beheld, and the 
ashes, were more dreadful than I, prepared 
as I was by the saddest of forebodings, 
could have imagined. Other parts of my 
diocese, which I have not yet had time to 
visit, have in like manner been laid waste. 



33* 



Questions and Answers 



Churches, schools, asylums, hospitals, con- 
vents in great number, are in ruins. En- 
tire villages have all but disappeared." 

Q. — Did he enumerate the afflicted 
places? 

A. — Yes. He enumerated them thus : 
"Werchter-Wackerzeel, for instance, out 
of 380 homes 130 remain ; at Tremeloo, 
two-thirds of the village was razed to the 
ground ; at Bueken out of 100 houses 20 
are standing ; at Schaffen 189 houses out 
of 200 are destroyed — 11 still stand. At 
Louvain, a third part of the city has been 
destroyed ; 1,074 dwellings have disap- 
peared ; on the town land and in the sub- 
urbs, Kessel-Loo, Herent and Herverle, 
together 1,828 houses have been burnt." 
He named altogether 57 towns and vil- 
lages that had been devastated. 

Q. — How many people did he 
charge had been killed or de- 
ported ? 

A. — "Thousands of Belgian citizens have 
been deported to prisons of Germany, 
Munsterlagen, Celle, Magdeburg. At 
Munsterlagen alone 3, 100 civil prisoners 
were numbered. Hundreds of innocent 
men were shot. I possess no complete 
necrology; but I know that there were 91 
shot at Aerschot, and that there, under 
pain of death, their fellow-citizens were 
compelled to dig their graves. In the Lou- 
vain group of communes 176 persons, men 
and women, old men and sucklings, rich 
and poor, in health and sickness, were shot 
or burnt." 

Q. — Did he say that priests had 
been killed? 

A. — "In my diocese alone, I know that 
13 priests or religious were put to death. 
One of these, the parish priest of Gelrode, 
suffered, I believe, a veritable martyrdom. 
There were to my actual personal knowl- 
edge more than 30 in the dioceses of 
Namur, Tournai and Liege." 

Q. — Was the pastoral letter read in 
the Belgian churches? 

A. — The letter was read in all the pul- 
pits. A few hours later many of the 
priests who had read it were arrested, sev- 
eral of them in Brussels, among them the 
Doyen of the collegiate of Ste. Gudule. 
After an interchange of letters between 
the Cardinal and von Bissing, the latter 
called on the Cardinal, who refused to re- 
tract or modify the statements. 



Q. — What did Von Bissing do 
then? 

A— He sent an order to the priests of 
the diocese of Malines prohibiting a sec- 
ond reading of the letter and its circu- 
lation. The Cardinal declared that he had 
not assented to a withdrawal of any of his 
instructions, and the letter was read again 
on the following Sunday. 

Q. — Was the Cardinal arrested? 

A. — He was ordered to remain within 
the confines of his ecclesiastical palace in 
Malines. 

Q. — How did the Belgians treat 
German soldiers who fell in 
their hands? 

A. — Hugh Gibson, Secretary of the 
American Legation, thus describes what 
he saw in Brussels when three hundred 
German prisoners were brought in. "The 
crowd, mindful of the things the Germans 
have been doing to this little country, 
were in no friendly mood, but did noth- 
ing violent. There was only a small guard 
of Belgian Garde Civique to escort the 
prisoners, but there were no brickbats or 
vegetables. The people limited themselves 
to hoots and catcalls and hisses — which 
were pretty thick. And even this was 
frowned upon by the authorities. Within 
a couple of hours the Military Governor 
had posted a proclamation begging the 
people of Antwerp to maintain a more 
dignified attitude and to refrain from any 
hostile demonstration against other pris- 
oners. This batch was surrounded and 
caught at Aerschot, where the Germans 
are said to have committed all sorts of 
atrocities." — From "A Journal of Our 
Legation in Belgium." 

Q. — What was the secret news- 
paper published in Belgium? 

A— It was called "La Libre Belgique," 
and it began to appear soon after German 
occupation began. It consisted of four 
pages and said what it liked about the 
"Occupant." It published news and texts 
barred from the censored press. It was 
distributed in a secret way that baffled the 
Germans, although they detailed their 
cleverest secret service men and spies to 
the task of discovering those responsible 
for its publication. Every number was 
delivered to the important German officials 
in Brussels, and, more remarkable still, it 
appeared, without fail, in the house of the 
German Governor-General himself. 



RECORD OF EVENTS 
IN THE GREAT WAR 



RECORD OF EVENTS IN THE GREAT WAR 



1914 

June 28. — The Austrian Archduke, Fran- 
cis Ferdinand, is murdered at Serajevo, 
Bosnia, by a Serbian. 

July 23. — Austria-Hungary sends an ulti- 
matum to Serbia. 

July 25. — Serbia agrees to most of the 
demands of Austria-Hungary, and asks ar- 
bitration of the rest. 

July 28. — Austria-Hungary declares war 
on Serbia. 

July 31. — Germany demands that Russia 
cease its mobilization. 

August 1. — Germany declares war on 
Russia. 

August 2. — German troops enter the 
neutral Duchy of Luxemburg. 

Belgium refuses free passage of Ger- 
man troops. 

August 3. — Germany declares war on 
France. 

German troops enter Belgium, meeting 
with stubborn resistance. 

August 4. — Great Britain declares war 
on Germany. 

August 6. — Austria-Hungary declares 
war on Russia. 

August 8. — The first British troops are 
landed in France; French troops cross 
the German frontier into Alsace-Lorraine. 

August 15-23. — French armies are forced 
to retire after engagements at Morhange 
(Alsace-Lorraine) and at Neufchateau and 
Charleroi (Belgium). 

August 16. — Japan demands the German 
possessions at Kiau-chau, China. 

August 19. — The German Army occupies 
Liege, having been delayed two weeks by 
Belgian resistance. 

August 20. — Germans occupy Brussels. 

August 23. — The British at Mons (Bel- 
gium), holding left wing, are attacked by 
a superior force and compelled to join in 
retreat of whole Allied line. 

Japan declares war on Germany. 

August 26 — Louvain is destroyed as pun- 
ishment for an alleged attack by Belgian 
citizens on German troops. 

August 28. — British and German war- 
ships meet in the first naval engagement 
in Heligoland Bight; five small German 
vessels are destroyed. 

A Russian army invading East Prussia 
is disastrously defeated at Tannenberg. 

September 2. — A Russian army invading 
the Austrian province of Galicia occupies 
Lemberg after decisively defeating the 
Austrians. 

September 3. — The seat of the French 
Government is transferred to Bordeaux. 



September 5. — Great Britain, France, 
and Russia agree not to conclude separate 
peace. 

September 6-10. — In the Battle of the 
Marne, the French defeat the Germans, 
stop the march toward Paris and force a 
hasty retreat. 

September 12. — The German retreat is 
halted at River Aisne, from Soissons to 
Argonne forest; trench warfare begins. 

September 20. — The "race to the sea" is 
begun — the rival armies in France endeav- 
oring to turn each other's western flank, 
and the intrenched line mounts northward 
from the Oise to the North Sea. 

The famous Cathedral at Rheims, 
France, is wrecked by German guns. 

September 22. — Three British cruisers 
are sunk in the North Sea by a German 
submarine. 

October 9. — Antwerp is occupied by 
Germans after ten days' bombardment; the 
Belgian army escapes. 

October 16-28.— In the Battle of the 
Yser, German attempt to sweep down 
Belgian coast is blocked chiefly by flood- 
ing of rivers and canals. 

October 20-November 11. — The first 
Battle of Ypres results in loss of terri- 
tory by British and French, but in fail- 
ure of Germany's attempt to reach Chan- 
nel ports. 

October 29. — Turkey enters the war as 
an ally of Germany and Austria-Hungary, 
bombarding Russian ports on Black Sea. 

November 1. — A naval engagement is 
fought off coast of Chile; two British 
cruisers are sunk by the German fleet. 

November 7. — The Japanese capture 
Tsing-tau, the fortified portion of German 
possessions at Kiau-chau. 

November 9. — The British War Secre- 
tary announces that 1,250,000 men are in 
training in England. 

November 15. — The deadlock on the 
western front begins, destined to last, 
with little change, for years. 

December 6. — The Germans occupy 
Lodz, Poland, after six weeks of sangui- 
nary fighting during which both German 
and Russian armies in turn faced disaster. 

December 8. — The German Pacific fleet 
is destroyed by a British squadron near 
the Falkland Islands; four German war- 
ships are sunk and one escapes. 

December 14. — Austrians evacuate Bel- 
grade and all Serbia, after a severe defeat. 

December 16. — German cruisers bom- 
bard cities on east coast of England. 

December 17. — Great Britain declares 
Egypt to be a British protectorate, termi- 
nating suzerainty of Turkey. 



34i 



Record of Events in the Great War 



December 26 — The United States pro- 
tests to Great Britain against seizure and 
detention of cargoes for neutral ports. 



1915 



defeat 



January 3-4. — Russian armies 
Turkish forces in the Caucasus. 

January 16. — Russian armies begin to 
pass over Carpathians from Galicia into 
plains of Hungary. 

January 24. — A naval engagement is 
fought in the North Sea off Dogger Bank, 
between powerful British and German 
fleets, ending in a British victory. 

January 26. — The German Government 
seizes all corn, wheat, and flour — the be- 
ginning of a rationing system. 

January 30. — German submarines sink 
several British merchant ships. 

February 2. — Great Britain decides to 
seize grain and flour shipments to Ger- 
many. 

February 4. — Germany declares a sub- 
marine war zone around the British Isles, 
after February 18, and announces that 
enemy merchant ships will be destroyed; 
neutral vessels are warned of danger. 

February 10. — The United States pro- 
tests to Germany against risks created 
by German war zone decree — the "strict 
accountability" note. 

The United States protests to Great 
Britain against use of American flags on 
British vessels. 

February 12. — A second Russian inva- 
sion of East Prussia comes to an end, 
after a disastrous defeat in the Masurian 
Lake region. 

February 16. — Germany offers to with- 
draw war-zone decree if Great Britain 
permits movement of foodstuffs to civil 
population of Germany. 

February 18. — The German war zone 
decree becomes effective; Germany dis- 
claims responsibility for accidents to neu- 
tral vessels. 

February 19-20. — British and French 
warships bombard Turkish forts at en- 
trance to Dardanelles. 

February 20. — The United States sends 
an identic note to Great Britain and Ger- 
many, suggesting agreement on (1) Brit- 
ain's interference with food for German 
civilians and (2) German submarine 
methods. 

February 20-23 — Two American steam- 
ships are sunk by mines in North Sea. 

March 1. — Premier Asquith announces 
Great Britain's intention to prevent com- 
modities of any kind from reaching or 
leaving Germany. 

March 10. — The British employ for first 
time massed artillery fire preliminary to 
an infantry advance; they occupy Neuve 
Chapelle, but fail to win road to Lille. 



The German converted cruiser "Prinz 
Eitel Friedrich" enters Hampton Roads, 
after a seven months' commerce-destroy- 
ing voyage from China. 

March 14. — The German cruiser "Dres- 
den" (which escaped from Falklands bat- 
tle) is sunk by British warships off Chile. 

March 19. — One French and two Brit- 
ish battleships are sunk by floating mines 
while bombarding forts in the Darda- 
nelles, ending the attempt to force a pas- 
sage without support from land. 

March 21. — A third Russian invasion 
of East Prussia is brought to an end, by 
a defeat at Memel. 

March 22. — The Austrian fortress of 
Przemysl is surrendered to the Russians, 
after a long siege, with 130,00 prisoners. 

April 5. — Russia announces capture of 
Carpathian positions on a 75-mile front. 

April 11. — The German converted cruis- 
er "Kronprinz Wilhelm" enters Hampton 
Roads, having remained at sea eight 
months. 

April 21. — Britain's army in active serv- 
ice is officially said to be 750,000. 

April 22-May 8.— In the Second Battle 
of Ypres the Germans gain ground north 
of that gained in the first battle, but again 
fail to break through the British line; 
they employ asphyxiating gas for the 
first time. 

April 25. — Anglo-French troops are 
landed on both sides of the Dardanelles, 
after suffering heavy casualties. 

May 1. — A Russian army is destroyed 
in the Battle of the Dunajec (east of Cra- 
cow), and other Russian armies in the 
Carpathians are forced to retreat hastily. 

May 7. — The "Lusitania" is sunk by a 
German submarine without warning; 1,154 
persons lose their lives, including 114 
Americans. 

May 12. — A British commission inves- 
tigating charges of German cruelty in 
Belgium reports deeds unparalleled in 
three centuries of civilized warfare. 

May 13. — The United States protests 
to Germany against its submarine policy 
culminating in sinking of "Lusitania," and 
declares that it will not omit any word 
or act necessary to maintain the rights 
of its citizens. 

May 23. — Italy enters the war, against 
Austria-Hungary only. 

May 25-27. — Two British battleships 
are sunk by a German submarine in the 
Dardanelles. 

June 3. — Russian forces evacuate 
Przemysl and continue the retreat in Ga- 
licia. 

June 8. — The American Secretary of 
State, William J. Bryan, resigns. 

June 9. — The United States sends a 
second note to Germany relating to the 
"Lusitania." 



342 



Record of Events in the Great War 



Jnne 11. — Italian forces occupy Gra- 
disca, in an advance toward Trieste. 

June 29. — Austria-Hungary protests to 
United States against supplying war ma- 
terials to Allies. 

July 5. — The Austro-German move- 
ment against Russians ends — having blocked 
the threatened invasion of Hungary and prac- 
tically cleared Austria of Russians. 

July 8. — Germany offers safety to 
United States vessels in submarine zone 
under specified conditions. 

July 9. — German Southwest Africa is 
surrendered to union of South Africa 
troops under General Botha. 

July 15. — Germany admits that Ameri- 
can steamer "Nebraskan" was damaged 
by torpedo from a German submarine. 

July 21. — The United States declares 
Germany's submarine proposal to be 
"very unsatisfactory," and states that fur- 
ther incidents will be regarded as "delib- 
erately unfriendly." 

July 25. — The American steamer "Lee- 
lanaw," carrying contraband, is sunk by a 
German submarine, warning being given. 

August 4. — German troops occupy War- 
saw, capital of Russian Poland, after a 
swift encircling advance over vast terri- 
tory, from north, west and south. 

August 7. — Additional British troops 
are landed on Gallipoli Peninsula, at 
Suvla Bay, in an unsuccessful attempt to 
flank the Turks. 

August 15. — The British Government 
registers all persons in the United King- 
dom between ages of 15 and 65. 

August 16-20. — The Germans fail in at- 
tempt to enter the Gulf of Riga, losing 
several small vessels. 

August 17-September 20. — The Germans 
capture Kovno, Brest-Litovsk, Grodno, 
Vilna, and other fortresses on Russia's 
second line of defense. 

August 19. — The "Arabic" is sunk by a 
German submarine on way to New York; 
twenty passengers (including several 
Americans) being drowned. 

August 21. — Italy declares war on Tur- 
key. 

The British Government declares cot- 
ton absolute contraband. 

September 1. — The German Ambassa- 
dor at Washington declares that here- 
after liners will not be sunk by German 
submarines without warning. 

September 7. — The Russian Grand Duke 
Nicholas is displaced from command of 
all Russian armies. 

September 9. — The United States de- 
mands recall of Austro-Hungarian Am- 
bassador, Dr. Dumba. 

September 20. — The Bulgarian army is 
mobilized. 

September 23. — The Greek army is mo- 
bilized. 



September 25. — The French undertake 
an offensive in Champagne region, which 
gains ground but fails to break through 
the German line. 

Anglo-French troops north and south 
of Lens gain ground in an offensive de- 
signed principally to aid the French at- 
tack in Champagne; but the British, at 
Loos, suffer heavy losses. 

October 3. — Russia demands that Bul- 
garia expel German and Austrian officers. 

October 4. — Allied forces arc landed at 
Salonica, Greece, to help Serbia resist a 
threatened Austro-German invasion. 

October 5. — Germany regrets the "Ara- 
bic" sinking, and declares similar inci- 
dents impossible. 

Premier Venizelos of Greece resigns, 
his war policy being supported by Depu- 
ties but vetoed by King. 

October 7. — Austro-German armies be- 
gin an invasion of Serbia. 

October 11. — Bulgaria, invading Serbia, 
enters the war as an ally of Germany, 
Austria-Hungary, and Turkey; the Ser- 
bians are obliged to withdraw to south 
and west. 

October 12. — Edith Cavell, an English 
nurse at Brussels, is shot by German mili- 
tary authorities, for assisting enemies of 
Germany to escape from Belgium. 

October 15. — The Greek Government 
refuses to help Serbia, although bound 
by a defensive treaty. 

October 21. — The United States, in a 
second protest against detention of car- 
goes for neutral ports, declares Britain's 
blockade "ineffective, illegal, and indefen- 
sible." 

October 28. — Aristide Briand (Social- 
ist) succeeds Viviani as Premier of France. 

November 9. — The Italian passenger 
steamer "Ancona" is sunk in the Medi- 
terranean by an Austrian submarine. 

November 11. — A War Council is 
formed in Great Britain. 

November 19. — A British expeditionary 
force in Mesopotamia is defeated at Ctesi- 
phon, near Bagdad. 

November 28. — Germany declares the 
campaign against Serbia at a close, prac- 
tically the entire country being overrun 
by Austro-German and Bulgarian armies 
and the Serbian army being half dis- 
persed, half annihilated. 

December 1. — Italy joins in Allied 
agreement not to conclude a separate 
peace. 

December 3. — The United States re- 
quests the recall of German naval and 
military attaches at Washington. 

December 6. — The United States pro- 
tests to Austria-Hungary against the 
"wanton slaughter of' defenseless non- 
combatants" on the "Ancona." 

December 9. — Chancellor von Beth- 



343 



Record of Events in the Great War 



mann-Hollweg informs Reichstag So- 
cialists that Germany cannot propose 
peace without indicating weakness, but 
is ready to discuss Entente proposals. 

December 15. — General Sir Douglas 
Haig becomes commander-in-chief of 
British armies in France and Belgium, 
succeeding Sir John French. 

December 30. — Austria announces that 
the submarine commander who torpedoed 
the "Ancona" has been punished. 

1916 

January 4. — The United States pro- 
tests to Great Britain against interfer- 
ence with American mails to and from 
neutral countries. 

January 9. — British and French forces 
withdraw from Gallipoli Peninsula, and 
the attempt to force the Dardanelles is 
abandoned. 

January 11-17. — Montenegro is over- 
run by Austro-Hungarian armies. 

January 24-27. — A compulsory service 
bill applicable to unmarried men between 
18 and 41 passes British House of Com- 
mons and House of Lords, and receives 
royal assent. 

February 1. — The British passenger 
steamer "Appam" is brought into Hamp- 
ton Roads, Va., by a German prize crew. 

February 10. — Germany and Austria 
announce that they will treat armed 
enemy merchant ships as war vessels. 

February 16. — The Turkish fortress at 
Erzerum, Armenia, is captured by Rus- 
sians. 

February 21. — The Germans launch a 
great offensive at Verdun, destined to 
last until August, but to fail in the attempt 
to break through French line. 

February 26. — Austrian armies force 
Italians to evacuate Durazzo, Albania. 

March 8. — Germany declares war on 
Portugal, for breaches of neutrality. 

March 15. — Admiral von Tirpitz, fore- 
most advocate of submarine ruthlessness, 
resigns as German Minister of Marine. 

March 24. — The British Channel steam- 
er "Sussex" is torpedoed without warn- 
ing by a German submarine. 

April 3. — The French make their first 
important counter-attack at Verdun. 

April 18. — The United States warns 
Germany that unless present methods of 
submarine warfare are abandoned, diplo- 
matic relations will be severed. 

April 20. — Russian troops are landed in 
France. 

April 22. — A German attempt to land 
arms and ammunition in Ireland is 
thwarted; Sir Roger Casement, Irish na- 
tionalist leader, is taken prisoner. 

April 24.— A revolution breaks out in 
Dublin, Ireland, led by members of Sinn 



Fein society; suppressed within a week, 
casualties on both sides totalling 304 
killed and 1,000 wounded; sixteen leaders 
are convicted of treason and shot. 

April 28. — A besieged British army of 
9,000, under General Townshend, surrend- 
ers to the Turks at Kut-el-Amara upon 
exhaustion of food; thus the first British 
attempt to reach Bagdad fails. 

May 4. — Germany informs United 
States that submarine commanders have 
been ordered not to sink merchant ves- 
sels without warning and without saving 
lives. 

May 17. — An Austrian offensive causes 
Italians to withdraw in Trentino. 

May 24. — The United States again pro- 
tests to Great Britain and France against 
interference with mails at sea, declaring 
it can no longer be tolerated. 

May 25. — The British Government's 
new compulsory military service bill, ap- 
plicable to men between 18 and 41, re- 
ceives royal assent. 

May 31. — British and German fleet9 
meet off Jutland (Denmark) in the great- 
est naval engagement of history, the Ger- 
mans finally withdrawing; British admit 
loss of six large cruisers and eight de- 
stroyers; Germans admit loss of a battle- 
ship, a battle cruiser, four light cruisers, 
and five destroyers; 9,500 lives are lost. 

June 4. — A Russian offensive is begun 
on front of 250 miles in Volhynia, Gali- 
cia, and Bukowina; the Russians later 
claiming 200,000 prisoners in three weeks. 

June 5. — Earl Kitchener, British Minis- 
ter of War, on his way to Russia is 
drowned by the sinking of cruiser "Hamp- 
shire" by mine or torpedo. 

June 6. — Continued German assaults at 
Verdun (beginning in February) result in 
capture of Fort Vaux. 

June 14. — An Economic Conference of 
the Allies is held at Paris. 

June 16. — The Austrian offensive against 
Italy ends, and an Italian counter-offen- 
sive is begun. 

June 28. — Karl Liebknecht, German So- 
cialist, is sentenced to thirty months' im- 
prisonment for peace activities. 

July 1. — A great Allied offensive is 
launched by British and French, at River 
Somme — to last until November, to gain 
ground, but to fail in its larger purpose. 

July 9. — The German commercial sub- 
marine "Deutschland," arrives at Balti- 
more, having crossed the Atlantic with 
cargo of chemicals — returning on August 
23 with gold, nickel and rubber. 

July 23. — Great Britain replies to United 
States mail protest, upholding efficiency 
of methods. 

July 26. — The United States protests to 
Great Britain against blacklisting of cer- 
tain firms and individuals. 



344 



Record of Events in the Great War 



August 3. — Sir Roger Casement is 
hanged at London for treason in promot- 
ing the Irish rebellion. 

August 7-9. — Italian troops capture Go- 
rir.a, in a brilliant attack. 

August 27. — Italy declares war on Ger- 
many. 

Rumania enters the war and begins an 
invasion of Transylvania, Hungary. 

August 29. — Field Marshal von Hinden- 
burg succeeds General von Falkenhayn as 
German Chief of Staff. 

September 4. — Bulgarian and German 
troops invade Dobrudja, Rumania, over- 
running the whole district by January. 

September 14. — The British use for first 
time (in the Somme battle) the "tank" or 
armored and armed motor truck, capable 
of crossing trenches and demolishing 
obstacles. 

October 8. — The German war submarine 
"U-53" sinks six European merchant 
steamships off Nantucket. 

October 11-16. — Greece's fleet is taken 
over by Allied fleet; the government of 
Venizelos is recognized. 

October 24. — The French at Verdun re- 
gain important positions lost to Germans 
from February to June. 

November 1. — The German merchant 
submarine "Deutschland" arrives at New 
London, Conn., on a second voyage, re- 
turning safely on December 10. 

November 5. — A new Kingdom of 
Poland is proclaimed by Germany and 
Austria, confined to territory conquered 
from Russia. 

November 7. — Cardinal Mercier, of Bel- 
gium, issues protests to civilized world 
against deportation of Belgian citizens 
for forced labor in Germany. 

November 19. — After decisively defeat- 
ing Rumanians in Transylvania, German 
armies begin an invasion of Rumania; 
Bucharest, the capital, is reached on De- 
cember 6. 

November 21. — Francis-Joseph, Em- 
peror of Austria and King of Hungary, 
dies at Vienna; he is succeeded by his 
grand-nephew Charles I. 

Dr. Aldred Zimmermann succeeds Von 
Jagow as Minister of Foreign Affairs in 
Germany. 

December 6. — David Lloyd George be- 
comes Premier of Great Britain, succeed- 
ing Asquith. 

December 12. — Germany offers to enter 
into peace negotiations; the offer is later 
declared by the ten Allies to be "empty 
and insincere." 

General Nivelle succeeds Joffre as Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the French armies. 

December 18. — President Wilson sends 
a note to the belligerent nations, suggest- 
ing an avowal of respective views regard- 
ing peace terms. 



December 21. — Secretary Lansing de- 
clares that the United States is "drawing 
nearer to the verge of war," later denying 
change of neutral policy is contemplated. 

December 26. — Germany replies to 
President Wilson's note, proposing a 
meeting of peace delegates, but failing 
to state war aims or peace terms. 

1917 

January 10.— The Entente Governments 
reply to President Wilson's note, stating 
general peace terms, which include res- 
toration, reparation, and indemnity. 

January 22.— President Wilson addresses 
United States Senate on peace: "It must 
be a peace without victory"; there should 
be an independent and autonomous Pol- 
and; outlets to sea should be neutralized 
and the seas should be free; military and 
naval armaments must be limited. 

January 31. — Germany resumes unre- 
stricted submarine war, declaring that 
"from February 1, 1917, sea traffic will be 
stopped with every available weapon and 
without further notice" [without warn- 
ing]; American passenger ships may sail 
once a week under prescribed conditions. 

The British Secretary of State for the 
Colonies declares that captured colonies 
will never return to German rule. 

February 3. — The United States severs 
diplomatic relations with Germany. 

February 4. — President Wilson invites 
neutral nations to take action against Ger- 
many similar to that taken by United 
States. 

February 13. — Denmark, Norway, and 
Sweden present an identic note to Ger- 
many refusing to recognize the submarine 
blockade as legal. 

February 22— A fleet of seven Nether- 
lands steamers is destroyed by a German 
submarine, after having been assured of 
"relative safety." 

February 23. — Great Britain inaugurates 
drastic measures to meet the food crisis 
by increasing home production and cur- 
tailing imports. 

February 25. — Kut-el-Amara, in Meso- 
potamia, is captured by British (after a 
campaign begun on December 13), re- 
trieving the surrender of April, 1916. 

February 26. — President Wilson asks 
Congress for authority to arm merchant 
ships. 

February 27. — Chancellor von Beth- 
mann-Hollweg declares in German Reich- 
stag that the United States has submitted 
to isolation from Germany while guarding 
the right of its citizens to trade with and 
travel in France and England. 

February 28. — A proposal from Zimmer- 
mann, German Foreign Secretary, be- 
comes known, looking to alliance with 



345 



Record of Events in the Great War 



1917 (Continued) 

Mexico in event of war with United States, 
and also suggesting Japanese participa- 
tion; Mexico to receive financial support 
and to be compensated with New Mexico, 
Texas, and Arizona. 

March 2-3. — Japan and Mexico deny that 
any proposal was received from Germany 
to join in a war against United States; 
Herr Zimmermann defends his plan, as 
operative only in event of war. 

March 11. — A revolution breaks out in 
Petrograd, Russia, the disturbances begin- 
ning over shortage of food, with sympa- 
thetic strikes in munition factories and 
finally with mutiny of troops; the Duma 
assumes direction of the movement. 

Bagdad, most important city of Meso- 
potamia and terminus of Germany's rail- 
way project, is captured by British troops. 

March 12. — The United States an- 
nounces that it has decided to arm mer- 
chant vessels. 

March 15. — Czar Nicholas abdicates the 
throne of Russia; Prince Lvoff becomes 
Premier. 

March 17-19. — The Germans withdraw 
before the British, evacuating 1,300 square 
miles of French territory, from Arras to 
Soissons, including Bapaume. 

Alexandre Ribot succeeds Briand as 
Premier of France. 

March 26. — The United States refuses to 
interpret and supplement the Prussian 
treaty of 1799, with reference to status of 
enemy residents. 

March 27. — A British expedition in the 
Holy Land defeats the Turks near Gaza. 

March 31-April 2.— The British and 
French capture a score of French villages 
near St. Quentin, where the German with- 
drawal had stopped. 

April 2. — President Wilson asks Con- 
gress to declare that recent acts of Ger- 
man Imperial Government are in fact war; 
the Senate adopts the war resolution, 82 to 
6, on April 4; the House, 373 to 50, on 
April 6. 

April 5. — Russian troops advancing from 
Persia effect a junction with the British 
army in Asia Minor. 

April 6. — The United States enters the 
war against Germany; ninety German ves- 
sels (600,000 tons) are seized. 

April 7. — Cuba and Panama follow the 
United States and declare war against 
Germany. 

The German Emperor directs the Chan- 
cellor to assist in obtaining franchise re- 
forms for the people. 

April 8. — Austria informs the United 
States that it has decided to sever diplo- 
matic relations. 

April 9-May 3. — The British launch an 
offensive against the German lines near 



Arras, carrying Vimy Ridge, gaining three 
to five miles, and piercing the famous 
Hindenburg line. 

April 11. — Brazil severs diplomatic rela- 
tions with Germany. 

April 13. — Bolivia severs diplomatic re- 
lations with Germany. 

April 16-May 6. — The French launch an 
offensive against the German line along 
the Aisne, advancing on a front of 25 miles 
between Soissons and Rheims, capturing 
Craonne Ridge. 

April 20. — Turkey severs relations with 
the United States. 

April 21. — A British mission arrives in 
United States headed by Foreign Secre- 
tary Balfour. 

April 24. — A French mission arrives in 
United States, headed by ex-Premier Vivi- 
ani and Marshal Joffre. 

April 28. — Guatemala breaks off rela- 
tions with Germany. 

May 4. — The American navy begins ac- 
tive participation in the war, a destroyer 
flotilla cooperating with the British fleet 
in the war zone. 

May 9. — The Russian Provisional Gov- 
ernment declares that "the frightful spec- 
tre of civil war and anarchy hovers over 
Russia, threatening its freedom." 

May 11. — The Russian Council of Work- 
men's and Soldiers' Delegates vote to 
•call a peace conference in a neutral 
country. 

May 15. — General Petain succeeds Gen- 
eral Nivelle as Commander-in-Chief of 
French armies. 

May 15-24. — The Italians make progress 
in an offensive against the Austrians, 
from Tolmino to the Adriatic. 

May 17. — A. F. Kerensky, a Russian 
Socialist leader, becomes Minister of War. 

May 18. — President Wilson signs a bill 
creating an army of 500,000 men under 
a selective conscription system — in addi- 
tion to Regulars and National Guard. 

May 19. — The reorganized provisional 
government in Russia rejects "all thought 
of a separate peace," but welcomes a gen- 
eral peace without annexation or indem- 
nity. 

June 4-7. — The Austrians in a counter- 
attack on Carso Plateau recover a third 
of territory recently lost to Italians. 

June 5. — The French Chamber of Dep- 
uties, 453 to 55, declares that peace terms 
must include the restoration of Alsace- 
Lorraine. 

June 7. — With a great mine explosion, 
the British blast away the top of Wyt- 
schaet-Messines Ridge, dominating Ypres 
from the south, and wipe out a German 
salient. 

June 9. — President Wilson warns the 
Russian provisional government against 
German propaganda. 



346 



Record of Events in the Great War 



June 12-29. — Greece becomes a bellig- 
erent: King Constantine abdicates the 
throne on June 12, in favor of his son 
Alexander, in response to the demands 
of England, France and Russia; Venizelos 
becomes Premier on June 25, and diplo- 
matic relations with Germany are severed 
on June 29. 

June 13. — Major-General Pershing and 
his staff arrive in Paris, to prepare for 
the first American expedition. 

June 15. — An American mission to Rus- 
sia, headed by Elihu Root, is welcomed 
at Petrograd by the provisional govern- 
ment. 

The first American war loan is closed, 
with the $2,000,000,000 offered oversub- 
scribed by 50 per cent. 

June 17. — The Russian Duma votes in 
favor of "an immediate offensive in close 
cooperation with Russia's allies." 

June 18 — Haiti severs diplomatic rela- 
tions with Germany. 

June 26. — The first American troops ar- 
rive in France, having sailed secretly on 
June 14. 

June 28. — Brazil revokes its decree of 
neutrality — equivalent to a declaration of 
war on Germany. 

July 1-17. — The Russian army, led by 
Minister of War Kerensky, assumes an 
offensive (in Galicia) for first time since 
the revolution; Halicz is captured, and 
36,000 German, Austrian, and Turkish 
prisoners. 

July 11. — Premier Ribot declares that 
France's right to Alsace-Lorraine will 
not admit of a plebiscite. 

July 14. — A German political crisis over 
peace demands brings the resignation of 
Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg and 
Foreign Secretary Zimmermann; Dr. 
Georg Michaelis becomes Chancellor. 

July 19. — The German Reichstag adopts 
a peace resolution (proposed by Social- 
ists, Radicals and Catholics) expressing 
desire of German people for peace without 
forcible acquisitions of territory, and 
with mutual understanding and lasting 
consideration. 

Finland proclaims its independence, the 
beginning of a widespread movement 
throughout Russia to establish separate 
governments. 

July 19-26. — The recently 'victorious 
Russian army mutinies and retreats in 
the face of a German counter-attack; Ke- 
rensky becomes Premier, with unlimited 
powers. 

July 22. — Siam declares war on Ger- 
many and Austria. 

July 25. — A convention assembles at 
3ublin to settle the Irish question. 

July 27. — The Allies decide to withdraw 
from Greece, except from Salonica. 

Premier Lloyd George declares that 



Great Britain has enrolled more than 5,- 
000,000 soldiers, besides 500,000 in the 
navy and 1,000,000 from dominions and 
colonies. 

July 30.— The French High Commis- 
sioner to the United States declares that 
France's present fighting strength is 
3,000,000 men, who hold two-thirds of the 
western front. 

July 31. — A Franco-British offensive in 
Flanders, Belgium, results in an advance 
of two and a half miles, heavy rains inter- 
fering. 

August 6. — Richard von Kuehlmann be- 
comes Minister of Foreign Affairs in 
Germany. 

August 7. — Liberia declares war on 
Germany. 

August 14. — China declares war on 
Germany and Austria. 

August 15. — A peace appeal by Pope 
Benedict (dated August 1) is made pub- 
lic; he suggests disarmament, evacuation 
of Belgian and French territory, restitu- 
tion of German colonies, and settlement 
of political and territorial questions in a 
conciliatory spirit for the general welfare. 

Canadian troops capture Hill 70, domi- 
nating Lens (declared impregnable by 
Germans). 

August 20-24.— Dr. Alexander Wekerle 
becomes Premier of Hungary. 

A French attack at Verdun results in 
the capture of important positions and 
4,000 prisoners. 

August 24-September 14. — Italian forces 
capture Monte Santo and Monte San Ga> 
briele, Austrian strongholds near Gorizia. 

August 27. — President Wilson replies 
to the Pope's peace message; he con- 
demns proposals for punitive damages, 
the dismemberment of empires, and the 
establishment of economic leagues, but 
declares that a peace agreement made by 
present German rulers must be supported 
by German people. 

American exports to neutral countries 
are placed under Government control. 

September 3. — Riga, Russia's second 
most important seaport, is occupied by 
Germans, the demoralized Russian army 
withdrawing. 

September 6. — Premier Ribot declares 
that France will not consent to diplo- 
matic discussion of Alsace-Lorraine. 

September 7-10. — Premier Ribot re- 
signs and Paul Painlev6 becomes Premier 
of France. 

September 8. — Intercepted telegrams 
from Luxburg, German Cnarg6 in Argen- 
tine, to Berlin, recommend that Argen- 
tine vessels, if sunk by German subma- 
rines, should be destroyed "without leav- 
ing a trace." 

September 15. — A Russian Republic is 
proclaimed. 



347 



Record of Events in the Great War 



September 18. — Premier Painleve states 
France's war aims as the disannexation 
of Alsace-Lorraine, reparation for ruin, 
and a just peace with guarantees against 
aggression. 

September 19-25. — The Argentine Con- 
gress votes to break diplomatic relations 
with Germany; President Irigoyen does 
not carry out the recommendation. 

September 20-October 12. — A series of 
British attacks in the Ypres sector are all 
retarded by muddy ground. 

September 21. — German and Austrian 
replies to the Pope ignore the status of 
occupied territory, but declare for imme- 
diate negotiations among the belligerents; 
a supplemental reply on September 26 of- 
fers to contribute toward compensation 
to Belgium, but demands economic rights 
and a guarantee against any "Belgian 
menace such as threatened Germany in 
1914." 

October 6. — Peru severs diplomatic re- 
lations with Germany. 

October 7. — Uruguay severs diplomatic 
relations with Germany. 

October 12. — The German Minister of 
Marine, Admiral von Capelle, resigns fol- 
lowing a mutiny in the Baltic Fleet. 

October 17. — The American transport 
"Antilles," homeward bound, is torpedoed 
and sunk with the loss of 70 lives. 

A naval engagement in the Gulf of 
Riga results in the sinking of a Russian 
battleship. 

October 20. — Five Zeppelin airships are 
destroyed in France after a raid over 
England. 

October 23-25. — A French offensive 
near Soissons results in a maximum gain 
of nearly four miles with 12,000 prisoners. 

October 24-November 10. — An Austro- 
German army, with overwhelming artil- 
lery, breaks through the Italian line and 
causes withdrawal not only from Aus- 
trian territory, but from northern Italy 
to the Piave River line. 

October 26. — Brazil declares war on 
Germany, following the sinking of a 
fourth merchant vessel. 

October 27. — Subscriptions for the sec- 
ond American war loan are closed; ac- 
ceptances totalling $3,808,766,150. 

October 30. — Count George F. von 
Hertling succeeds Michaelis as Chan- 
cellor of Germany. 

Vittorio Orlando becomes Premier of 
Italy, succeeding Boselli. 

November 3. — Germany announces the 
first capture of American soldiers, north 
of Luneville. 

November 5. — American patrol boat 
"Alcedo" is sunk by a German submarine 
with a loss of 21 lives. 

November 8-14. — A second revolution 
in Russia, under direction of Bolsheviki 



(or Maximalist faction of Radical Social- 
ists), results in overthrow of Kerensky 
government; the new Premier Lenine and 
Foreign Minister Trotzky declare for an 
immediate democratic peace, the handing- 
over of land to peasants, and the convoca- 
tion of a constitutional assembly. 

November 9. — A Supreme War Council 
is created, composed of the Prime Min- 
ister and a military representative from 
each Government. 

November 12. — Premier Lloyd George 
speaks in Paris on lack of cooperation 
among the Allies; he recalls the Serbian 
"tragedy," its repetition in Rumania, and 
the Italian disaster. 

November 13-15. — Painleve resigns and 
Georges Clemenceau becomes Premier of 
France. 

November 17. — The British in Palestine 
occupy Jaffa. 

November 20. — The British at Cambrai 
move forward without the usual artillery 
preparation, gaining five miles on a wide 
front and capturing 8,000 Germans; 
"tanks" play an important part. 

November 28. — The revolutionary gov- 
ernment in Russia makes public a secret 
agreement entered into with Italy on 
April 26, 1915, by Great Britain, France 
and Russia; Italy's claims to Austrian 
territory were recognized in return for 
joining the Allies. 

November 29. — An Inter-Allied Con- 
ference is opened at Paris, the Premiers 
of France and England attending and 
Col. Edw. M. House representing U. S. 

November 30-December 5. — German 
counter-attacks regain half the ground 
recently lost to British near Cambrai. 

December 1. — German East Africa, last 
and largest of Germany's overseas pos- 
sessions, comes under complete control 
of Allied forces. 

December 4-7. — The United States Con- 
gress, following recommendations by 
President Wilson, declares war on Aus- 
tria-Hungary. 

December 6. — A large section of Hali- 
fax, Nova Scotia, is destroyed by an ex- 
plosion; 150 persons are killed and 20,000 
rendered homeless. 

United States destroyer "Jacob Jones" 
is sunk by a German submarine, with a 
loss of 66 lives. 

December 7. — An armistice goes into 
effect on the Russo-German front. 

December 8. — Ecuador severs diplo- 
matic relations with Germany. 

December 10. — Jerusalem is occupied 
by British forces. 

December 20. — Premier Lloyd George 
states Britain's peace terms: restoration 
of German-occupied territory, with repa- 
ration; the future of German colonies to 
be based upon wishes of native races. 



348 



Record of Events in the Great War 



December 22. — A peace conference as- 
sembles at Brest-Litovsk, German-occu- 
pied Russia, with delegates from Russia, 
Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and 
Turkey; the Central Powers propose a 
general peace without forcible annexa- 
tions and indemnities, the Allies to join 
with Russia; Russia must recognize the 
demand of the peoples of Poland, Lithu- 
ania, Courland, Esthonia and Livonia for 
self-government, and German troops will 
not be withdrawn from those territories. 

1918 

January 5. — Premier Lloyd George re- 
states war aims of Great Britain, declar- 
ing that destruction of Germany or Aus- 
tria-Hungary and the separation of Tur- 
key's capital are not war aims; the Al- 
sace-Lorraine wrong of 1871 must be re- 
considered, the Dardanelles must be neu- 
tralized, and Arabia, Armenia, Mesopo- 
tamia, Syria, and Palestine must not be 
restored to Turkish sovereignty. 

January 7. — Earl Reading, Lord Chief 
Justice of England, is appointed High 
Commissioner and Special Ambassador 
to the United States. 

January 8. — President Wilson addresses 
Congress on America's program of world 
peace, specifying fourteen "rectifications 
of wrong and assertions of right." 

January 16. — The United States Fuel 
Administrator orders the closing of man- 
ufacturing industries for five days, and of 
all non-essential businesses for nine Mon- 
days, to save fuel and relieve railroads. 

January 20. — In a naval engagement at 
the Dardanelles, with British vessels, a 
Turkish battleship is sunk and another 
disabled. 

January 21. — Strikes in Austrian cities, 
in favor of peace, but aggravated by food 
shortage, cause the closing of important 
war industries. 

January 24. — Chancellor von Hertling 
replies to peace terms of Premier Lloyd 
George and President Wilson — declining 
to allow interference in Russian affairs, 
leaving Italian matters to Austria-Hun- 
gary to answer, pledging support to Tur- 
key against proposals affecting its terri- 
tory, declaring that withdrawal from 
France should be agreed upon between 
Germany and France, that Belgian de- 
tails be settled at a peace conference, and 
that dismemberment of Alsace-Lorraine 
can never be considered. 

The Austro-Hungarian Prime Minister 
states that Austria demands no territory 
from Russia, and makes overtures for a 
direct "exchange of ideas" with the 
United States. 

January 28-February 4. — Strikes occur 
in Berlin and other German cities in favor 



of peace without indemnities or annexa- 
tions, the abolition of militarism in war 
industries, and participation of workmen 
in peace parleys. 

February 5. — The British transport 
"Tuscania," carrying 2,200 American sol- 
diers under British convoy, is sunk off 
Ireland, 170 soldiers being lost. 

February 6. — The French High Com- 
missioner to United States declares there 
are 4,725,000 French soldiers under arms, 
nearly three million being in war zone, 
holding three-fourths of the western front 
of 470 miles. 

February 9. — The first peace treaty is 
signed between representatives of Cen- 
tral Powers and the new Republic of 
Ukraine, in Southern Russia. 

Germany claims the capture of Ameri- 
can prisoners at Xivray, east of St. Mihiel. 

February 11. — President Wilson, ad- 
dressing Congress, analyzes recent Aus- 
tro-German peace utterances and restates 
four principles upon which a just and per- 
manent peace could be founded. 

The Russian Government, though re- 
fusing to sign a peace treaty, declares 
war with Central Powers at an end. 

February 18-19. — Germany resumes hos- 
tilities against Russia; the Russian Gov- 
ernment declares its willingness to sign 
the peace treaty dictated by the Teutons. 

February 22. — Norway guarantees that 
American imports will neither reach 
Germany nor replace Norwegian prod- 
ucts exported to Germany. 

February 25. — Chancellor von Hertling 
expresses fundamental agreement with 
President Wilson's four principles, and 
declares that peace can be discussed on 
such a basis; England's war aims are still 
"thoroughly imperialistic." 

February 27. — Japanese military opera- 
tions in Siberia are proposed, to save vast 
quantities of military supplies. 

March 3. — A peace treaty is signed at 
Brest-Litovsk, between Russia and the 
four Central Powers; besides territory al- 
ready occupied by Germans, new terms 
compel Russia to "evacuate" Ukrainia, 
Esthonia and Livonia, Finland, the Aland 
Islands, and the Transcaucasian districts 
of Erivan, Kars, and Batum. 

March 5. — A preliminary peace treaty 
is signed between Rumania and the Cen- 
tral Powers, Rumania giving up province 
of Dobrudja to the Danube and accepting 
"frontier rectifications" demanded by 
Austria-Hungary. 

March 7. — A treaty of peace is signed 
between Germany and Finland. 

March 9. — The Government of Russia 
is transferred from Petrograd to Moscow. 

March 10. — The American Secretary of 
War, Mr. Baker, arrives in France on a 
tour of inspection. 



349 



Record of Events in the Great War 



It is announced that American troops 
are in trenches at four points — on the 
Lorraine front, northwest of Toul; in the 
Champagne; in Alsace near Luneville; 
and in the Chemin-des-Dames region 
northwest of Rheims. 

March 11. — President Wilson expresses 
sympathy with Russian people in a mes- 
sage to the Congress of Soviets, meeting 
at Moscow to ratify German peace treaty. 
March 20. — The United States seizes 
Dutch vessels in American ports after 
giving notice that the shipping agreement 
reached with Allies, postponed through 
fear of Germany, should be put into ef- 
fect. 

March 21. — The British Admiralty pub- 
lishes its record of merchant ships sunk 
to end of 1917; British ships, 7,079,492 
tons; total ships, 11,827,572 tons. 

March 21-29.— The first phase of the 
greatest battle of the war. The Germans 
launch an attack against fifty miles of 
British and French line in Picardy, from 
Arras to La Fere, gaining a maximum of 
thirty miles. 

March 23. — Paris is bombarded by long- 
range guns from a distance of seventy 
miles. 

March 29. — General Ferdinand Foch, 
the French strategist, becomes com- 
mander-in-chief of the Allied forces in 
France — British, French, American, Ital- 
ian, Belgian, and Portuguese. 

April 2. — The Austro-Hungarian For- 
eign Minister, Count Czernin, declares 
that the four points laid down by Presi- 
dent Wilson on February 11 are a basis 
on which to discuss general peace; he 
doubts whether the President will suc- 
ceed in uniting his Allies on such a basis. 
April 6. — President Wilson condemns 
Germany's peace treaties forced upon 
Russia and Rumania, and proclaims that 
America will meet with "force to the ut- 
most" Germany's challenge. 

April 9-16. — The second phase of the 
great battle. The German blow shifts to 
the north, from La Bassee to Ypres, the 
British evacuating portions of Messines 
and Passchendaele Ridges. 

April 10. — The Russian Commissioner 
of Commerce states that the treaty with 
Germany has taken away 300,000 square 
miles of territory, with 56,000,000 inhabi- 
tants (32 per cent, of Russia's entire popu- 
lation), besides one-third of her railways, 
73 per cent, of iron, and 89 per cent, of 
coal. 

April 11. — The French Government 
makes public a letter from Emperor 
Charles, of Austria (dated March 31, 
1917) communicated to President Poin- 
care, pledging support to "France's just 
claims regarding Alsace-Lorraine" and to 



reestablishment of Belgium and Serbia. 

April 12. — The Irish Convention, after 
eight months of deliberation, presents a 
divided report to the British Govern- 
ment, proposing an Irish Parliament of 
two nouses; it was not found possible to 
overcome objections of Ulster Unionists. 

April 13. — German troops occupy Hel- 
singfors, Finland. 

April 14. — The Navy Department an- 
nounces that the U. S. S. "Cyclops" has 
been missing since March 4, with 293 
persons on board. 

April 18. — Premier Lloyd George's Man 
Power bill becomes a law in Great Britain, 
raising the age limit for compulsory serv- 
ice to fifty years, and extending con- 
scription to Ireland. 

April 21. — Guatemala declares war 
against Germany. 

May 7. — Nicaragua declares war on 
Germany and her allies. 

May 27-June 1. — The third phase of the 
great battle for Paris. The Germans move 
southward along the front from Soissons 
to Rheims, reaching the Marne — a maxi- 
mum advance of thirty miles. 

June 9-11. — The fourth phase of the 
German offensive. The Germans ad- 
vance toward Compiegne, between the 
salients created by the first and third 
phases. 

June 15-23. — The Austrians launch a 
supreme effort along the whole line of the 
Piave River, are partly successful at first, 
but are thrown back in disorder across the 
river by an Italian counter-offensive. 

June 19. — The fifth phase of the great 
battle in France. The Germans attempt 
to take the city of Rheims by attacks from 
three sides; they gain ground but fail in 
their main object. 

July 15. — Haiti declares war on Ger- 
many. 

July 16. — The sixth phase of the great 
German offensive. The Germans attack 
along a fifty-mile front centering at 
Rheims, gaining ground to the west but 
being held on the east. 

July 18. — The Allied army in France 
(French and American units), under the 
lead of the strategist Foch, launches a suc- 
cessful counter-attack against the western 
side of the salient in the German line 
from Soissons to Chateau-Thierry; gains 
are immediate and constant, and by Au- 
gust 3 the whole salient is abolished — an 
advance of twenty-five miles. 

July 19. — Honduras declares war against 
Germany. 

August 4. — The opening of the fifth 
year of war finds the Allies on the of- 
fensive all along the line in France, the 
initiative having been wrested from the 
Germans. 



350 



Record of Events in the Great War 



August 8-10. — A new Allied drive is 
directed against the German salient 
near Amiens; the attacking troops are 
British, French, and American, under 
I Field-Marshal Haig, and they advance 
fourteen miles. 

August 15. — American troops land at 
Vladivostok, to cooperate with an Al- 
lied army in Siberia. 

August 18-20. — A third offensive is 
directed against the German line by the 
British in the Lys salient south of 
Ypres. 

August 20. — The Allied army's blow 
is shifted once again, to the region be- 
tween the Oise and the Aisne; the su- 
periority of the Allies becomes clear, 
and a forced evacuation of French ter- 
ritory is begun by the Germans — Al- 
bert is reoccupied on August 22, Noyon 
and Bapaume on the 29th, Peronne on 
September 1, St. Quentin on October 
1, Lens on October 2, Cambrai on Oc- 
tober 9, Laon and LaFere on October 
13, Lille and Ostend on October 17, 
Valenciennes on November 2, Sedan on 
November 7, Tournai, Mezieres, and 
Tournai on November 8, and Mons and 
Maubeuge on November 11. 

September 3. — The United States 
recognizes the Czechoslovaks as a co- 
belligerent with a de facto government. 

September 4.— American troops are 
landed at Archangel, Russia. 

September 12. — The American army 
carries out its first great offensive, 
wiping out the long-standing and dan- 
gerous salient at St. Mihiel and restor- 
ing 150 square miles of French terri- 
tory. 

Thirteen million Americans from 18 
to 45 register for military service un- 
der the amended Selective Draft Act. 

September 14. — Austria-Hungary in- 
vites belligerents to a confidential and 
unbinding discussion on the basic 
principles for the conclusion of peace; 
President Wilson refuses to entertain 
the proposal on September 16. 

September 15. — The Servian army, 
supported by French, British, and 
Greek forces, launches an offensive 
against the Bulgarians. 

September 19-20. — British forces un- 
der General Allenby decisively defeat 
the Turks; 40,000 prisoners are taken 
by September 25; Damascus is reached 
on October 1, Aleppo on October 26 
(an advance of 275 miles). 

September 27. — President Wilson 
declares for impartial justice at the 
peace table, and expresses belief in a 
league of nations as most essential, 
with no alliances within the league. 

September 29. — Bulgaria withdraws 



from the war, acaepting terms dictated 
by the Allied commander, including 
evacuation of Servian and Greek terri- 
tory and the use of Bulgarian roads by 
Allied troops. 

October 2. — Prince Maximilian of 
Baden becomes German Imperial Chan- 
cellor, succeeding Count von Hertling. 

October 4. — King Ferdinand of Bul- 
garia abdicates in favor of Crown 
Prince Boris. 

October 5. — The new German Chan- 
cellor requests the President of the 
United States to take a hand in the 
restoration of peace, and accepts as a 
basis for negotiation the President's 
program as set forth in his speeches 
of January 8 and September 27. 

October 14. — President Wilson in- 
forms Germany that no armistice can 
be arranged without safeguards for the 
military supremacy of the Allies, and 
calls special attention to one of his 
July 4 peace essentials — the destruction 
of arbitrary power in Germany. 

October 21. — The German Foreign 
Secretary declares that recent changes 
in form of government place responsi- 
bility with the people. 

October 23. — It is announced that 
2,000,000 American soldiers have sailed 
for overseas service, nearly half of 
them since July 1. 

October 24. — The Italian army, aided 
by British and French forces, opens an 
attack which results in the complete 
collapse of the Austro-Hungarians. 

October 31. — Turkey withdraws from 
the war, accepting terms dictated by 
the Allies. 

November 3. — Mutiny spreads 
throughout the German fleet and naval 
bases. 

November 4. — Austria-Hungary with- 
draws from the war, accepting an 
armistice dictated by the Allies. 

November 5. — IThe United States in- 
forms Germany that the Inter-Allied 
War Council has agreed to make peace 
with Germany on terms laid down in 
President Wilson's addresses, with two 
exceptions: freedom of the seas must 
be reserved for the peace conference, 
and compensation for damage done to 
civilian population and property must 
be made by Germany. 

November 9. — It is reported that 
Wilhelm has abdicated as German Em- 
peror; Friedrich Ebert, Socialist, is ap- 
pointed Imperial Chancellor pending 
establishment of a constitutional as- 
sembly. 

November 11. — German delegates 
sign an armistice agreement presented 
by Marshal Foch, and hostilities come 
to an end. 



351 



Text of the Armistice with Germany 



I.— Military Clauses on Western Front 

One — Cessation of operations by land and 
in the air six hours after the signature of 
the armistice. 

Two — Immediate evacuation of invaded 
countries : Belgium, France, Alsace-Lor- 
raine, Luxemburg, so ordered as to be com- 
pleted within fourteen days from the sig- 
nature of the armistice. German troops 
which have not left the above-mentioned 
territories within the period fixed will be- 
come prisoners of war. Occupation by the 
Allied and United States forces jointly 
will keep pace with evacuation in these 
areas. AH movements of evacuation 
and occupation will be regulated in ac- 
cordance with a note annexed to the stated 
terms. 

Three — Repatriation beginning at once to 
be completed within fifteen days of all the 
inhabitants of the countries above enumer- 
ated (including hostages, persons under 
trial or convicted). 

Four — Surrender in good condition by 
the German armies of the following war 
material : Five thousand guns (2,500 heavy 
and 2,500 field), 25,000 machine guns, 3,000 
minenwerfer, 1,700 airplanes (fighters, 
bombers — firstly, all of the D 7's and all 
the night bombing machines). The above 
to be delivered in situ to the Allied and 
United States troops in accordance with 
the detailed conditions laid down in the 
note (annexure No. 1) drawn up at the 
moment of the signing of the armistice. 

Five — Evacuation by the German armies 
of the countries on the left bank of the 
Rhine. The countries on the left bank of 
the Rhine shall be administered by the local 
troops of occupation. The occupation of 
these territories will be carried out by Al- 
lied and United States garrisons holding the 
principal crossings of the Rhine (Mayence, 
Coblentz, Cologne), together with the 
bridgeheads at these points of a thirty- 
kilometer radius on the right bank and by 
garrisons similarly holding the strategic 
points of the regions. A neutral zone shall 
be reserved on the right bank of the Rhine 
between the stream and a line drawn paral- 
lel to the bridgeheads and to the stream 
and at a distance of ten kilometers from 
the frontier of Holland up to the frontier 
of Switzerland. The evacuation by the 
enemy of the Rhinelands (left and right 
bank) shall be so ordered as to be com- 
pleted within a further period of sixteen 
days, in all, thirty-one days after the sign- 
ing of the armistice. All the movements 
of evacuation or occupation are regulated 
by the note (annexure No. 1) drawn up 
at the moment of the signing of the 
armistice. 



Six — In all territories evacuated by the 
enemy there shall be no evacuation of in- 
habitants ; no damage or harm shall be done 
to the persons or property of the inhabi- 
tants. No person shall be prosecuted for 
offenses of participation in war measures 
prior to the signing of the armistice. No 
destruction of any kind shall be committed. 
Military establishments of all kinds shall be 
delivered intact, as well as military stores 
of food, munitions, and equipment, not re- 
moved during the time fixed for evacuation. 
Stores of food of all kinds for the civil 
population, cattle, etc., shall be left in situ. 
Industrial establishments shall not be im- 
paired in any way and their personnel shall 
not be removed. 

Seven — Roads and means of communica- 
tion of every kind, railroads, waterways, 
main roads, bridges, telegraphs, telephones, 
shall be in no manner impaired. All civil 
and military personnel at present employed 
on them shall remain. Five thousand loco- 
motives and 150,000 wagons in good work- 
ing order, with all necessary spare parts 
and fittings, shall be delivered to the asso- 
ciated powers within the period fixed in 
annexure No. 2, and total of which shall 
not exceed thirty-one days. There shall 
likewise be delivered 5,000 motor lorries 
(camione automobiles) in good order, with- 
in the period of thirty-six days. The rail- 
ways of Alsace-Lorraine shall be handed 
over within the period of thirty-one days, 
together with pre-war personnel and ma- 
terial. Further, the material necessary for 
the working of railways in the countries on 
the left bank of the Rhine shall be left in 
situ. All stores of coal and material for 
the upkeep of permanent ways, signals, and 
repair shops shall be left in situ. These 
stores shall be maintained by Germany in- 
sofar as concerns the working of the rail- 
roads in the countries on the left bank of 
the Rhine. All barges taken from the Al- 
lies shall be restored to them. The note, 
annexure No 2, regulates the details of 
these measures. 

Eight — The German command shall be 
responsible for revealing within the period 
of forty-eight hours after the signing of 
the armistice all mines or delayed action 
fuses on territory evacuated by the German 
troops and shall assist in their discovery 
and destruction. It also shall reveal all 
destructive measures that may have been 
taken (such as poisoning or polluting of 
springs and wells, etc.). All under penalty 
of reprisals. 

Nine — The right of requisition shall be 
exercised by the Allied and United States 
armies in all occupied territories, subject 
to regulation of accounts with those whom 
it may concern. The upkeep of the troops 



352 



Text of Armistice 



353 



of occupation in the Rhineland (excluding 
Alsace-Lorraine) shall be charged to the 
German government. 

Ten — The immediate repatriation with- 
out reciprocity, according to detailed con- 
ditions which shall be fixed, of all Allied 
and United States prisoners of war, in- 
cluding persons under trial or convicted. 
The Allied Powers and the United States 
shall be able to dispose of them as they 
wish. This condition annuls the previous 
conventions on the subject of the exchange 
of prisoners of war, including the one of 
July, 1918, in course of ratification. How- 
ever, the repatriation of German prisoners 
of war interned in Holland and in Switz- 
erland shall continue as before. The 
repatriation of German prisoners of war 
shall be regulated at the conclusion of the 
preliminaries of peace. 

Eleven — Sick and wounded who cannot 
be removed from evacuated territory will 
be cared for by German personnel, who 
will be left on the spot with the medical 
material required. 

II.— Disposition Relative to the Eastern 
Frontiers of Germany 

Twelve — All German troops at present in 
the territories which before belonged to 
Austria-Hungary, Rumania, Turkey, shall 
withdraw immediately within the frontiers 
of Germany as they existed on August 1, 
1914. All German troops at present in the 
territories which before the war belonged 
to Russia shall likewise withdraw within 
the frontiers of Germany, defined as above, 
as soon as the Allies, taking into account 
the internal situation of these territories, 
shall decide that the time for this has come. 

Thirteen — Evacuation by German troops 
to begin at once, and all German instructors, 
prisoners, and civilians as well as military 
agents now on the territory of Russia (as 
defined before 1914) to be recalled. 

Fourteen — German troops to cease at 
once all requisitions and seizures and any 
other undertaking with a view to obtaining 
supplies intended for Germany in Ru- 
mania and Russia (as defined on August 
1, 1914). 

Fifteen — Renunciation of the treaties of 
Bucharest and Brest-Litovsk and of the 
supplementary treaties. 

Sixteen — The Allies shall have free ac- 
cess to the territories evacuated by the Ger- 
mans on their eastern frontier, either 
through Danzig, or by the Vistula, in order 
to convey supplies to the populations of 
those territories and for the purpose of 
maintaining order. 

III. — Clause Concerning East Africa 

Seventeen — Evacuation by all German 
forces operating in East Africa within a 
period to be fixed by the Allies. 



IV. — General Clauses 

Eighteen — Repatriation, without reciproc- 
ity, within a maximum period of one month 
in accordance with detailed conditions 
hereafter to be fixed of all interned 
civilians, including hostages (persons?), 
under trial or convicted, belonging to the 
allied or associated powers other than those 
enumerated in Article Three. 

Nineteen — The following financial condi- 
tions are required : Reparation for dam- 
age done. While such armistice lasts no 
public securities shall be removed by the 
enemy which can serve as a pledge to the 
Allies for the recovery or reparation for 
war losses. Immediate restitution of the 
cash deposit in the national bank of Bel- 
gium, and in general immediate return 
of all documents, specie, stocks, shares, 
paper money, together with plant for the 
issue thereof, touching public or private 
interests in the invaded countries. Restitu- 
tion of the Russian and Rumanian gold 
yielded to Germany or taken by that power. 
This gold to be delivered in trust to the 
Allies until the signature of peace. 

V. — Naval Conditions 

Twenty — Immediate cessation of all hos- 
tilities at sea and definite information to 
be given as to the location and movements 
of all German ships. Notification to be 
given to neutrals that freedom of naviga- 
tion in all territorial waters is given to the 
naval and mercantile marines of the allied 
and associated powers, all questions of 
neutrality being waived. 

Twenty-one — All naval and mercantile 
marine prisoners of war of the allied and 
associated powers in German hands to be 
returned without reciprocity. 

Twenty-two — Surrender to the Allies and 
United States of all submarines including 
submarine cruisers and all mine-laying sub- 
marines) now existing, with their complete 
armament and equipment, in ports which 
shall be specified by the Allies and United 
States. Those which cannot take the sea 
shall be disarmed of the personnel and ma- 
terial and shall remain under the super- 
vision of the Allies and the United States. 
The submarines which are ready for the 
sea shall be prepared to leave the German 
ports as soon as orders shall be received 
by wireless for their voyage to the port 
designated for their delivery, and the re- 
mainder at the earliest possible moment. 
The conditions of this article shall be 
carried into effect within the period of 
fourteen days after the signing of the 
armistice. 

Twenty-three — German surface warships 
which shall be designated by the Allies and 
the United States shall be immediately dis- 
armed and thereafter interned in neutral 



354 



Text of Armistice 



ports or in default of them in allied ports 
to be designated by the Allies and the 
United States. They will there remain un- 
der the supervision of the Allies and of the 
United States, only caretakers being left 
on board. The following warships are des- 
ignated by the Allies : Six battle cruisers, 
ten battleships, eight light cruisers (includ- 
ing two mine layers), fifty destroyers of 
the most modern types. All other surface 
warships (including river craft) are to be 
concentrated in German naval bases to be 
designated by the Allies and the United 
States and are to be completely disarmed 
and classed under the supervision of the 
Allies and the United States. The military 
armament of all ships of the auxiliary fleet 
shall be put on shore. All vessels desig- 
nated to be interned shall be ready to leave 
the German ports seven days after the sign- 
ing of the armistice. Directions for the 
voyage will be given by wireless. 

Twenty-four — The Allies and the United 
States of America shall have the right to 
sweep up all mine fields and obstructions 
laid by Germany outside German territorial 
waters, and the positions of these are to be 
indicated. 

Twenty-five — Freedom of access to and 
from the Baltic to be given to the naval 
and mercantile marines of the allied and 
associated powers. To secure this the Al- 
lies and the United States of America shall 
be empowered to occupy all German forts, 
fortifications, batteries, and defense works 
of all kinds in all the entrances from the 
Cattegat into the Baltic, and to sweep up all 
mines and obstructions within and without 
German territorial waters, without any 
question of neutrality being raised, and the 
positions of all such mines and obstructions 
are to be indicated. 

Twenty-six — The existing blockade con- 
ditions set up by the allied and associated 
powers are to remain unchanged, and all 
German merchant ships found at sea are to 
remain liable to capture. The Allies and 
the United States shall give consideration 
to the provisioning of Germany during the 
armistice to the extent recognized as 
necessary. 

Twenty-seven — All naval aircraft are to 
be concentrated and immobilized in German 
bases to be specified by the Allies and the 
United States of America. 

Twenty-eight — In evacuating the Belgian 
coast and ports Germany shall abandon in 
situ and in fact all port and river naviga- 
tion material, all merchant ships, tugs, 
lighters, all naval aeronautic apparatus, ma- 
terial and supplies, and all arms, apparatus 
and supplies of every kind. 

Twenty-nine — All Black Sea ports are to 
be evacuated by Germany; all Russian war* 
vessels of all descriptions seized by Ger- 
many in the Black Sea are to be handed 



over to the Allies and the United States 
of America; all neutral merchant vessels 
seized are to be released; all war-like and 
other materials of all kinds seized in those 
ports are to be returned and German ma- 
terials as specified in Clause Twenty-eight 
are to be abandoned. 

Thirty — AH merchant vessels in German 
hands belonging to the allied and associated 
powers are to be restored in ports to be 
specified by the Allies and the United States 
of America without reciprocity. 

Thirty-one — No destruction of ships or 
of materials to be permitted before evacua- 
tion, surrender, or restoration. 

Thirty-two — The German government shall 
formally notify the neutral governments of 
the world, and particularly the governments 
of Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Holland, 
that all restrictions placed on the trading 
of their vessels with the allied and asso- 
ciated countries, whether by the German 
government or by private German interests, 
and whether in return for specific conces- 
sions, such as the export of shipbuilding 
materials, or not, are immediately canceled. 

Thirty-three — No transfers of German 
merchant shipping of any description to any 
neutral flag are to take place after signa- 
ture of the armistice. 

VI. — Duration of Armistice 

Thirty-four — The duration of the armis- 
tice is to be thirty days, with option to 
extend. During this period if its clauses 
are not carried into execution the armis- 
tice may be denounced by one of the con- 
tracting parties, which must give warning 
forty-eight hours in advance. It is under- 
stood that the execution of Articles 3 and 
18 shall not warrant the denunciation of 
the armistice on the ground of insufficient 
execution within a period fixed, except in 
the case of bad faith in carrying them into 
execution. In order to assure the execution 
of this convention under the best conditions, 
the principle of a permanent international 
armistice commission is admitted. This 
commission will act under the authority of 
the allied military and naval Commanders 
in Chief. 

VII.— The Limit for Reply 
Thirty-five — This armistice to be ac- 
cepted or refused by Germany within 
seventy-two hours of notification. 



This armistice has been signed the 
Eleventh of November, Nineteen Eighteen, 
at 5 o'clock French time. 

F. FOCH, 

R. E. WEMYSS, 

ERZBERGER, 

A. OBERNDORFF, 

WINTERFELDT, 

VON SALOW. 



PRONUNCIATION OF WAR NAMES 



THE PRONUNCIATION OF WAR NAMES 

By C. O. Sylvester Mawson, Litt.D., Ph.D. 

(Copyright 1918 by C. S. Hammond & Co., New York City) 

KEY TO PRONUNCIATION 

Vowel sounds: ale, bare, arm, ask, senate, am, organ, sofd ; eve, event, end, novel, baker ; Tee, Til ; old, 8rb, 8bey, 
odd, combine ; use, urn, unite, up, lociist ; food, foot ; ou as in out; oi as in oil; u as in menu. 

Note. — u, as in French menu or German Midler, has no equivalent in English. To produce it, hold the lips rigidly in 
position to say 65 and attempt to say e. o or oe in German resembles the English u in urn; e. g., Golhe or Goethe is pro- 
nounced gfl'te. 

Consonants: As in English, ch as in chair ; g as in go ; kw for qu as in queen ; s as in so ; sh as in she ; z as in zone ; 
zh as z in azure. 

Special symbols: K (small capital) for ch as in German ich or Scotch loch ; n (small capital) indicates nasal tone of 
preceding vowel, as in French bon (Son) ; n ( = ng) for n before the sound of k or hard g as in bank (bank), finger (f In'ger) ; 
' indicates the elision of a vowel, or a mere suggestion of a vowel sound, as in Ypres (e'pr'). 

Accents: The principal or primary accent is indicated by a heavy mark ('), and the secondary accent by a lighter 
mark (') ; thus, Bouvines (boo'ven'); Massachusetts (mas'd-choo'sets). 

Note.- — French names have the primary accent on the final full syllable, but this accent should generally be very slight. 
The other syllables are marked with equal stress. In German names, the principal accent is placed earlier in the word, as in 
English. In Hungarian and Bohemian names, the accent is on the first syllable. In Polish, as in Italian, the accent is on the 
penult. In Russian, the accent is capricious but very marked. 



Aachen (or Aix-la-Chapelle), a'Ken 

Aalst (or Alost), alst 

Abbeville, ab'vel' 

Abee, a'ba' 

Acheux, a'shfl' 

Achicourt, a'shS'koor' 

Achiet, a'shya' 

Acossee, a'ko'sa' 

Acoz, a'ko' 

Acq, ak 

Adelsberg, a'd?ls-b?rK 

Adige (river), a'de-ja 

Adinkerke, ad'en-ker'ke 

Arlria, a'dre-a 

Aerschot, ar'sKot 

Aerseele, ar'sa'le 

Aettfrycke, at'fre-ke 

Aehre, a're 

Agincourt, a'zhaN'koor' ; Eng. aj'Tn- 

kort 

Agordo, a-gor'do 
Ahrdorf, ar'dorf 
Ahrweiler, ar'vT-ler 
Aidin, T-den' 
Aincreville. aN'kr'-vel' 
Aintab, Tn'tab' 
Aire, ar 

Aisne (river), an 
Aivenne, a'ven' 
Aix-la-Chapelle (or Aachen), aks'la'- 

sha'pel' 
Ala, a'la 
Albeek, al'bak 
Albert, al'bar' 
Albesdorf, al'bez-dorf 
Albona, al-bo'na 
Aleppo, d-lep'5 
Alexandretta (or Iskanderun), al'e.- 

zan-dret'a 
Aiken, al'ken 
Allarmont, a'lar'moN' 
Alle, al'e 
Allennes, a'lSn' 
Allenstein, al'?n-shtTn' 
Allondrelle, a'loN'drSl' 
Alost (or Aalst), a'18st 
Alsdorf , alz'dorf 
Alsemberg, aKzem-bgrK 
Althofen, iilt'ho'fen 
Altkirch, alt'kTrK' 
Altzingen, alt'zTng-en 
Amance, a'maNs' 
Amanweiler, a'man-vT'lgr 
Ambacourt, aN'ba'koor' 
Amblimont, aN'ble'moN' 
Ambresin, aN'br'-saN' 
Amel, a'mel 
Amiens, a'myaN' 
Amohines, a'mS'en' 



Amont, a'moN' 
Amougies, a'moo'zhe' 
Ampezzo, am-pet'so 
Ancre (river), aN'kr' 
Anderlecht, iin'drr-lgKt 
Andenne, aN'dgn' 
Angres, aN'gr' 
Anhee, ahKa' 
Aniches, a'nesh' 
Anlier, aN'lya' 
Anloy, aVlwa' 
Anneux, a'nu' 
Annevois, an'vwa' 
Anor, a'nor' 
Anould, a'nool' 
Anonx, a'noo' 
Ans, aNs 

Ansauville, aN'so'vel' 
Anthee, aN'ta' 
Antheit, an'tTt 
Anthelupt, aN'te-liip' 
Antilly, aN'te'ye' 
Antioch, an'tT-ok 
Antreppe, aVtrep' 
Anvin, aN'vaN' 
Any, a'ne' 
Anzelin, aNz'laN' 
Anzin, SN'zaN' 
Appilly, a'pe'ye' 
Apremont, a'pr'-m6N' 
Arbe, arb 
Arcey, ar'sS' 
Archennes, ar'shen' 
Arches, arsh 
Arco, ar'ko 
Ardahan, ar'da-han' 
Ardoye, ar'dwa' 
Argenteau, ar'zhan'to' 
Argonne, ar'gon' 
Arleux, ar'10' 
Arlon, ar'loN' 
Armentieres, ar'm'aN'tySr' 
Arnaville. ar'na'vel' 
Arques, ark 
Arracourt, a'ra'koor' 
Arras, a'ras' 
Array e, a'ra' 
Arry, a're' 
Ars, arz 

Arsdorf , arz'dorf 
Artes, art 
Artois, ar'twa' 
Arville, ar'vgl' 
Asch, ash 
Ascq, ask 
Asiago, ii'zya-g5 
Asolo, a'zo-lo 
Assche, as'Ke 
Assweiler, iis'vT-ler 

357 



Ath, at 

Athesans, a'te-saN' 

Athies, a'te' 

Athus, a'tii' 

Attainville, a'taN'vel' 

Attigny, a'te'nye' 

Atweiler, at'vi-ler 

Aube (river), ob 

Aubel, o'bel' 

Aubencheul. o'baN'shiil' 

Aubenton, o'ban'toN' 

Auberive, ob'rev' 

Aubers, 5'bar' 

Anbigny, o'be'nye' 

Aublain, 5'blaN' 

Auchel, o'shel' 

Auchy, o'she' 

Audenarde (or Oudenarde), ou'de- 

nar'de 
Audincourt, o'daN'koor' 
Audun, o'dtiN' 
Auge, ozh 

Augustowo, ou'goos-to'vo 
Aulnois, ol'nwa' 
Aulnoye, ol'nwa' 
Aumetz, ou'metz 
Auronzo, ou-ront'so 
Autel-Bas, o'tel'-ba' 
Autoing, 5'twaN' 
Autrey, o'tre' 
Auvillers, o've'lar' 
Avecapelle, av'ka'pgl' 
Avelghem, a'vgl-gem 
Avennes, a'ven' 
Avesnes, a'van' 
Aviano, a-vya'no 
Avion, a'vyoN' 
Avioth, a'vyo' 
Avricourt, a'vre'koor' 
Avril, a'vrel' 
Ay, a'e 
Ayette, a'yet' 
Awenne, a'vSn' 
Azerailles, a'ze-ra'y' 
Azoudange, at'sou-dang'e 

Baccarat, ba'ka'ra' 

Badia, ba-de'a » 

Baelegem, ba'le-gem 

Baelen, ba'len ; ba'liiN' 

Bagdad (or Bhagdad), bag-dad'; Eng. 

bag'dad 
Bagneux, ban'yfl' 
Baileux, ba'lfi' 
Bailleul, ba'yul' 
Baisieux, ba'zyQ' 
Baku, ba-koo' 
Bale (or Basel), bal 
Ballersdorf, bal'erz-d3rf 



Pronunciation of War Names 



Bambrugge, bam'broog'e 
Bannonville, ba'noN'vel' 
Bapaume, ba'pom' 
Barbarano, bar'ba-rii'no 
Bar-le— Due, bar'-le-duk' 
Baroncourt, ba'roN'koor' 
Baronville, ba'roN'vel' 
Baronweiler, ba'ron-vl'ler 
Baist, barst 
Barvaux, bar'vo' 
Bascoup, ba'koo' 
Basel (or Bale), ba'zpl 
Basra (or Busra), bus'ra 
Bassano, bas-sa'n5 
Bassee, La, la' ba'sa' 
Bastogne, bas'toVy' 
Batilly, ba'te^ye' 
Batum, ba-toom' 
Baudrecourt, bo'dr'-koor' 
Bauffe, bof 
Baugnies, bo'nye' 
Baulon, bo'loN' 
Bautersem, bou'ter-sem 
Bavay, ba've' 
Bazeilies, ba'zaV 
Beaucourt, bo'koor' 
Beaumetz, bo'mes' 
Beaumont, bo'm6N' 
Beauquesne, bo'kan' 
Beauraing, bo'raN' 
Beaurevoir, bo're-vwa' 
Beauvais, bo've' 
Beauval, bo'val' 
Beauvillers, bo've'lar' 
Bebing, ba'bing 
Bechy, beK'e 
Beckingen, bek'Tng-2n 
Becquevoort, bek'vort' 
Beeringen, ba'ring-en 
Beernem, bar'nem 
Beerst, barst 
Beine, ban 
Beinheim, bTn'hTm 
Beirut (or Beyrout), ba'root' 
Belfort, bel'for' 
Belgrade, bel'grad' 
Bellefontaine, bSl'foN'ten' 
Belleghem, b51'e-gem 
Bellem, bel'Sm 
Bellevaux, bel'vo'_ 
Bellicourt, bel'e'koor' 
Bellignies, be-le'nye' 
Belluno, bel-loo'no 
Belosi, ba-lo'se 
Belval, bSl'val' 
Belverne, bel'vgrn' 
Beney, be-nS' 
Benningen, ben'Tng-en 
Bensdorf , benz'dSrf 
Berchem, ber'Kem 
Berg, berK 

Berlaimont, beVle'moN' 
Bernecourt, bern'koor' 
Bernissart, ber'ne'sar' 
Bernweiler, bem'vl-ler 
Berquette, ber'ket' _ 
Bertincourt, ber'taN'koor' 
Bertogne, ber'ton'y' 
Bertrichamps, ber'tre'shaN' 
Bertrix, ber'tre' 
Berzee, ber'za' 
Besancon, be'zaN'soN' 
Bethonvilliers, be-toN've'yar' 
Bethune, ba'tiin' 
Bettainvillers, be'taN've'lar' 
Beuthen, boi'ten 
Bettemberg, bet'?m-berK 
Beverloo, bev'er-lo' 
Beverst, bev'erst 
Beyrout (or Beirut), ba'root' 
Bhagdad (or Bagdad), bag-dad' 
Bialystok, bya'li-stok 
Bienville, byaN'vel' 
Biesme, be'am' 
Biestre, be'es'tr' 
Bievre, be'av'r' 
Bihain, be'aN' 
Bilsen, Ml'sen 
Billy, be'ye' 



Binche, baNsh 

Bioncourt, byoN'koor' 

Bionville, byoN'vel' 

Bisten, bls'ten 

Bitburg, bit'boorK 

Bitschweiler, bTt'shvI'ler 

Biwer, be'va' 

Blandain, blaN'daN' 

Blagny, bla'nye' 

Blamont, bla'moN' 

Blaregnies, bla'ra'nye' 

Blaton, bla'toN' 

Bleialf, bli'alf 

Bleiburg, bll'boorK 

Bleid, blld 

Blenod, ble'no' 

Bloemendaele, bloo'mpn-da'le 

Blumenthal. bloo'mfn-tal 

Bockryck, bok'rek 

Boelhe, bool'e_ 

Boesinghe, boo'sTng-e 

Boevange, boo'vang-e 

Bohain, bo'aN' 

Boisleux, bwa'lfi' 

Boismont, bwa'moN' 

Boltweiler, bolt'vl-ler 

Bomal, bo'mal' 

Bomy, bo'me' 

Boncourt, boNTioor' 

Bonhome, bo'nom' 

Bonlez, boN'le' 

Bonnes, bon 

Bonneville, bon'vel' 

Bonnevoye, bon'vwa' 

Bonviller, boN've'ya' 

Boom, bom 

Borg, borK 

Borgo, bor'go 

Borsbeke, borz'ba-ke 

Bosphorus (or Bosporus), bos'po-rfis 

Bosseval, bos'val' 

Botoshani, bo-to-shan'y' 

Botzen, bot'sen 

Bouchain, boo'shaN' 

Bouchout, boo'shoo' 

Bouconville, boo'koN'vel' 

Boucq, book_, 

Boudour, boa'door' 

Bougnies, boo'nye' 

Bouillon, boo'yoN' 

Boulers, boo'lar' 

Boulogne, boo'lon'y' ; Eng. boo-lon' 

Boult, bool 

Bouquemaison, book'ma'zoN' 

Bourbourg, boor'boor' 

Bourcy, boor'se^_ 

Bourdonnay, boorMS'na' 

Bourg-Bruche, b6orK'-br6t>K'e 

Bourg-Fidele^boor'-fe'dal' 

Bourgogne, boor'gon'y' 

Boursies, boor'se' 

Boussy, boo^se' 

Bousval, boos'val' 

Bouverie, boov're' 

Bouvignes, boo'ven'y' 

Bouvigny, boo've'nye' 

Bouvines, boo'ven' 

Bouvron, boo^yroN' 

Bouxieres, boo'zyar' 

Boves, bov 

Bovigny, bo've'nye' 

Bovrinnes, bo'vrln' 

Bra, bra 

Brabant-le-roi, bra'baN'-le-rwa' 

Braffe, braf 

Braila, bra-e'Ia 

Braine, bran 

Braine-le-Comte, bran'-le-koNt' 

Braives, brav 

Branchon, braN'shoN' 

Brand, brant 

Braquis, bra'ke' 

Bras, bra 

Bratte, brat 

Braunsberg, brounz'berK 

Braux, br5 

Bray, brS 

Bray-sur-Seine, bre'-siir'-san' 

Bray-sur-Somme, bre'-sUr'-som' 



Breganze, bra-gant'sa 

Brenta (river), bren'ta 

Brest-Litovsk, brest'-lye-tofsk' 

Eretton, bret'on 

Brie, bre 

Briey, bre'e' 

Brin, braN 

Brioni bre-o'ne 

Brixen, bnk'sen 

Brouay, broo'e' 

Brouok, brouk 

Brouckirk, brou'kTrk 

Brouveliers, broov'lyar' 

Bruay, brii'e' 

Bruges, briizh 

Bruly-de-Pesche, briVle'-de-pash' 

Brusa (or Brussa), broo'sii 

Brussels (or Bruxelles), brus'elz 

Bruxelles (or Brussels), bru'sel' 

Bruyeres, brii'yar' 

Bry, bre 

Bucquoy, bii'kwa' 

Buczacz, boo'clmch 

Buderschled, boo'der-shet 

Budin, boo'dln 

Bug (river), boog 

Buhl, bool 

Buire, bwer 

Buironfosse, bwe'roxTos' _ 

Bukharest (or Bucharest)^ boo'kd-rest' 

Bukowina (Bukovina), boo'ko-ve'na 

Bullingen, bool'mg-en 

Bully, bii'ye' 

Bult, biil 

Burano, boo-ra'no 

Bures, bur 

Burnhaupt, boorn'houpt 

Burst, boorsf 

Burtscheid, boort'shTt 

Busendorf, boo'zen-dorf 

Bushire, b6t>-sher' 

Busigny, bii'se'nye'^ 

Busra (or Basra), bus'ra 

Butgenbach, boot'gen-baK 

Buttia, boot'ya 

Buzegney, bii'za'nye' 

Buzy, bii'ze' 

Buzieres, bii'zyar' 

Caesarea (or Kaisarieh), sSs-d-re'd 

Caeskerke, kiiz-ker'ke 

Calais, ka'le' ; Eng. kal'a 

Callenelle, kal'nel' 

Camblain, kaN'blaN' 

Cambrai (or Cambray), kaN'brS' 

Cambrin, kaN'braN' 

Camisano, ka'me-za'no 

Canfanaro, kan'fa-na'ro 

Cantain, kaN'taN' 

Capelle, La, la' ka'pSl' 

Capodistria, ka'po-des'tre-a 

Cappet, kap'et 

Caprino, ka-pre'no 

Carency, ka'raN'se' 

Carignan, ka'ren'yaN' 

Carnieres, kar'nyar' 

Carole, ka-ro'la 

Carvin, kar'vaN' 

Cassel, kas'el' 

Casteau, kas'to' 

Casteltranco. kas-t?l'frarj'ko 

Caster, kas'ta' 

Castre, kas'tr' 

Castua, kas'twa 

Cateau, Le, le ka'to' 

Catillon, ka'te'yoN' 

Caudry, ko'dre' 

Cavalese, ka'va-la'za 

Cavarzere, ka-viir'dza-ra 

Cerfontaine, ser'foN'tan' 

Cernavoda (or Tchernavoda), chSr'na- 

vo'dii 

Cernay, sSr'ne' 

Cetinje (or Cettinje), tset'en-ya 
Chalons-sur-Marne, sha'loN'-siir'- 

marn' 
Chalon-sur-Sa6ne, sha'loN'-siir'-son' 
Chambley, shaN'ble' 
Chambrey, shaN'bre' 



358 



Pronunciation of War Names 



Cnampagney, shaN'pa'nyg' 
Champigny, shaN'pe'nye' 
Chapelle, La, la' sha'pel' 
Charency, sha'raN'se' 
Charey, sha'rg' . . 

Charleroi (or Charleroy), shar'Ie-rwa' 
Charleville, sharl'vel' 
Charmois, shar'mwa' 
Chassart, shas'ar' 
Chastre, shas'tr' .. 

Chatalja (or Tchatalja) cha-tal'ja 
Chatcau-Regnault, sha'to'-re'nyo' 
Chateauroux, sha'to'roo' 
Chateau-Salins, sha'to'-sa'laN' 
Chateau-Thierry, sha'to'-tye're' 
Chatel, sha'tel' 
Chatelet, shat'le' 
Chatillon, sha'te'yoN' 
Chatillon-sur-Marne, sha'te'yoN'- 

siir'-marn' 

Chaudefontaine, shod'foN'tan' 
Chaulnes, sho'n' 
Chaumont, sho'moN' 
Chauny, sho'ne' _ 
Chauvsncy, sho'vaN'se' 

Chaux, sho w 

Cnemih des Dames, she'man' da dan, 

Chenevieres, shSn'vyar' 

Chenicourt, she-ne'koor' 

Cherain, she'raN' 

Cherso, kgr's5 

Chievres, she'g^vr' 

Chimay, she'me' 

Chiny, she'ne' , 

Chioggia, kyod'ja 

Ciney, se'ng' 

CiUadella. chet'ta-dgl'la 

Cividale, che've-da'la 

Clary, kla're' 

Clavier, kla'vya' 

Clemency, klgm'aN'se' 

Clerken, kler'ken 

Clermont, klgr'moN' 

Clervaux, kler'vo' 

Cleurie, klu're' 

Clezentaine, klez'aN'tan' 

Codroipo, ko-dro'e-po 

Coingt, kwaN 

Colroy, kol'rwa' 

Combles, koN'bl' 

Comines, ko'men' 

Commercy, kS'mer'se' 

Compiegne, koN'pyen'y 

f.nuflp kriN'da' 



Conde, koN'da 

Conegliano, ko'nal-ya'no 

Conflans, koN'flaN' 

Cons, k6Ns 

Conselve, kon-sSl'va . 

Constanta (or Kustendje), kon-stan'tsa 

Corbais, kor'be' 

Corbeek Loo, kor'bak lo 

Corbion, kor'byoN' 

Corceuil, kor'su'y' 

Corcieux, kor'syQ' 

Corey, kor'se' 

Cornieville, kor'ne'vel' 

Cornimont, kor'ne'moN' 

Corravillers, ko'ra've'lar' 

Cortemarck, kor'te-mark 

Cortessem, k6r't?s-em 

Cortina, kor-te'n'a 

Coucy, koo'se' „_,_,,* ,..,.-, 

Coucy-le-Chateau, koo'se'-le-sha'to' 

Coulommiers^ koo'18'mya' 

Coulonges, koo'l&Nzh' ... _. 

Courcelles-Chaussy, koor'sel'-shoV 

Courrieres, koo'ryar' 

Courtemont koort'moN' 

Courtrai, koor'tre' 

Court-St.-Btienne.koor'-saN'-ta'tyen' 

Couvin, koo'vaN' 

Cracow (or Krakow), kra'ko 

Crajova (or Craiova), kra-yo'va 

Craonne, kra'on' 

Crecy (or Cressy), kra'se' ; Ena. kres'i 

Crecy-sur-Serre, kra-se'-sur'-sar' 

Crevic, krg'vek' 

Crimea, krl-me'd; kn-me'a 



Croisilles, krwa'sel' 
Croismare, krwa'mar' 
Croix, krvva 
Crombeke, krom'ba-ke 
Crupet, kr'u'pe' 
Cuesmes, kwem 
Cuinchy, kwSN'she . 

Cul-des-Sarts, kiil'-de'-sar' 
Custines, kus'tSn' 
Cysoing, se'swaN' . 

Czenstochowa, cheN'sto-ko'va 
Czernowitz, cher'no-vlts 

Dagny, da'nve' 
Dagonville, da'goN'vel' 
Daleiden, da-17'den 
Dalheim, dal'him 
Dalstein, dal'shtin 
Bamas, da'm'a' 
Damascus, dd-mas'kfis 
Damerkirch, da'rruT-kenc 
Dainmartin, dliN'mar'taN' 
Damvillers, diiN've'ya' 
Daniele, da-nya'la_ 
Danjoutin, daN'joo'taN' 
Danne, dan'ne 
i Danzig (or Dantzic), dan'tslk 
Dardanelles, diir'dd-nelz' 
Darhamps, dar'aN' 
Darmont, dar'moN' . . ,* ■,*,. 

Dedeagatch (or Dedeagach), de-de a 

gach' 

Deerlyck, dar'lek 
TJelatyn (pass), de-la'ttn 
Delle, dSl 
Delme, del'me 
Denain, de-naN' 
Dendermonde (or Termondc), den'der 

mon'de 

Dergneau, der'nyo' 
Desvres, dav"r' , 

Diarbekr (.or Diarbekir), de-ar'bek' r 
Dickebusch. dik'e-bus 
Diedenhoien (or Thionville) : de'den 

ho'fen _ 

Dieulouard, dyu'loo'ar' 
Dieuze, dyuz 

Differdingen, dif'er-ding'cn 
Dignano, de-nya'no 
Dijon, de'zhoN' 
Dinant, de'naN' 
Dippach, dip'aK .. 

Dixmude, deks'mud' ; de'mud' 
Dnieper (river), ne'per 
Dniester (river), nes'ter 
Dolleren, dol'er-en 
Dombasle, doN'b'al' 
Dommartin, doN'mar'taN' 
Dommary, doN'ma're' 
Dompaire, doN'par' 
Don, dSN _ 

Doncourt, doN'koor' 
Dongelberg, dong^l-bgrx 
Donjoutin, doN'joo'taN' 
Dormans, dor'maN' 
Dornach, dor'niiK _ 
Douai (or Douay), doo'a' 
Doullens, doo'lr'N' 
Drave (river), drii've 
Drohobycz, dro-ho'btch 
Drouville, droo^'vel' 
Dubno, doob'no 
Dukla, dook'la 
Dunkirk, dun-kdrk^ 
Durazzo, doo-rat'so 
Durbuy, diir'boi' 
Diiren, dii'ren 



Eecke, a'ke 

Eecloo, a-klo' 

Bessen, a's?n 

Eglingen, eg'lTng-?n 

El Kuo.3 (or Jerusalem), el koodz 

Ellezelles, el'zel' 

Elsenborg, el'zcn-borK 

Elouges, a'lcozh' 

Eloyes, a'lwa' 
Elverdinghe, ?l'ver-dlng'e 
Embken, emp'km 
Enghien, LiN'gaN' 
Enos, a'nos 
Entroeungt, 'aN'tro'flN' 

Epernay, a'per'ng' 

Epinal, a'pe'nal' 

Epirus, e-pT'rtts 

Eppe Sauvage, ep' so'vazh' 

Erdorf, er'dorf 

Eregli, er'e-gle' 

Erivau, er'e-v;in' 

Ermeton, gr'm?-t6N' 
Erneuville, cr'nu'vel' 
Ernonheld, 5r'non-h61d 
Erpent, er'paN' 
Erpion, er'py6N' 
Erpoin, gr'pwaN' 
Erquelinnes, erk'len' 
Errouville, Sr'oo'vel' 
Ertvelde, ert'vel-de 
Ervilliers, er've'yar' 
Erzingan, er'zin-gan' 
Erzerum, erz-room' 
Escaudain, es'ko'daN' 
Esch, esh 

Eschweiler, esh'vT-ler 
Esnes, an 
Esneux, es'nu' 
Espierres, Ss'pyar' 
Esqueheries, Ss'ke-re' 
Essey, es'e' 
Estaires, es-tSr' 
' Esti, es'te 
Estinnes, es'tTn' 
Estre Blanche, gs'tr'-blaNsh' 

Etain, a'taN' 
Etalle, a'tal' 
Etival, a'te'val' 
Ettelbruck, et'el-br5&k 
Etueffont, a'tii'foN' 
Eulmont, ul'moN' 
Eupen, oi'pen 
Euphrates (river), u-fra'tez 
Everbecq, gv'er'bek' 
Bvergem, a'ver-g?m 

Evette, a'vgt' 
Eydtkuhnen, Tt-koo'n?n 
Eynatten, i-nat'en 
Eyne, T'ne 
Eysden, is'den 



Eberstein, S'ber-shtTn 
Ebersweiler, a'bers-vi'ler 

Ebly, a'ble' 

Echternach, eK'ter-naK 
Ecly, g'kle' 
Ecoivres, a'kw'a'vr' 
Ecossines, a'ko'sen' 
Ecouviez, a'koo'vya' 
Edeghem, a'de-ggm 
Edingen, a'ding-2n 

359 



Falaen, fa'lan' 
Falisolle, fa'le'sol' 
Falmagne, fal'man'y' 
Famars, fa'mar' 
Famillaveux, fa'mel'a'vfl' 
Farschweiler, farsh'vi-ler 
Faulx, fo 

Fauvillers, fo've'lar' 
Fays Dillot, fg'be'yo' 
Feignies, fg'nye' 
Feltre, fel'tra 
Feluy, fg-loi' 
Fepin, fa'paN' 

Fere, La, la' far' „.,...- • . 
Fere-Champenoise,far'-shaN'pe-riwa~ : ' 
Fere-en-Tardenois, far'-aN'-tard'nwa' 
Ferriere, fe'ryar' ,.,„,„, _, , -. 
Ferte-Gaucher, La, la' fer'ta'-go'sha' 
Ferte-sous-Jouarre, La, la' fgr'ta'- 

soo'-zhoo'ar' 
Fianona, fya-no'n'a 
Filsdori, felz'dorf 
Finnevaux, fTn'vo' 
Fins, faNs _ 
Fiume, fyoo'ma 



Pronunciation of War Names 



Flawinne, fla'vTn' 

Fleurbaix, flur'bS' 

Fleury, flu're' 

Fleville. flg'vel' 

Fligneux, fle'nyu' 

Flines, flen 

Flirey, fle're' 

Flobecq, flo'bek' 

Florennes, flo'ren' 

Florenville, flo'raN'vel' 

Floree, flo'ra' 

Fontaine, foN'ten' 

Fontenay, foNt'ng' 

Fontenoy, foNt'nwa' 

Fontoy, foN'twa' 

Fonzaso, fon-tsii'zo 

Forrieres, fo'ryar' 

Fosse, fos 

Fouchy, foo'she' 

Foucogney, foo'kon'yg' 

Foug, foo 

Fougerolles, foozh'rol' 

Fourmies, foor'me' 

Foville, fo'vel' 

Fraire, frar 

Fraise, fraz 

Fraize, fraz 

Framieres, fra'myar' 

Framont, fra'moN' 

Frecourt, fra'koor' 

Freisdorf , frlz'dorf 

Fresne, fren 

Fresnes-en-Woevre, irgn'-aV-vo'Sv'r 

Fresnoy, frg'nwa' 

Fretin, fre-taN' 

Freudenburg, froi'den-boSrK 

Freux, fru 

Prevent, fra'vaV 

Frevillers, fra've'lar' 

Fribourg, fre'boorK 

Fricourt, fre'koor' 

Friesach, fre'zaK 

Frisang, frg'zaN' 

Froidchapelle, frwa'sha'pSK 

Fromelles, fro'mel' 

Frouard, frdo'ar' 

Fumay, fii'me' 

Furnaux, fiir'no' 

Furnes, fiirn 

Gaesbeek, gaz'bak 
Gail (river), gal 
Galatz, ga'lats 
Galicia, gd-lish'I-d 
Gallaix, ga'lg' 
Gallipoli, gal-le'p5-le 
Gammerages, gam'razh' 
Gand (or Ghent), gaN 
Gargnano, gar-nya'no 
Gavis, g'a'fls 
Gavrelle, ga'vrSl' 
Gaza (or Ghazzeh), ga'zd 
Geet Betz, gat bgts 
Gelinden, gel'In-den 
Gelucourt, ga'loo-koort 
Gembloux, zhaN'bloo' 
Gemona, ja-mo'na 
Gemonville, zha'moVvel' 
Gemund, ga'moont 
Genappe, zhe-nap' 
Gerardmer, zha'rar'ma' 
Gerbepal, zherb'pal' 
Gerbeviller, zhgrb've'ya' 
Gerouville, zha'roo'vel' 
Gesponsart, zhe'p&Vsar' 
Ghazzeh (or Gaza), guz'S 
Ghent (or Gand), ggnt 
Ghistelles, ge'stel' 
Ghyvelde, ge-vel'de 
Gibecq, zhe'bek' 
Gildweiler, gelt'vi-ler 
Girecourt, zher'koor' 
Giromagny, zhe'riVma'nye"' 
GironviUe, zhe'roN'vel' 
Givenchy, zhe'vaN'she' 
Givet, zhe'vg' 
Givry, zhe'vre' 
Gladbeek, glad'bak 
Gleiwitz, gll'vlts 



Glimes, glem 
Glons, gloN 
Gmiind, g'miint 
Gnesen, g'na'zen 
Godarville, gS'dar'vel' 
Gogney, gS'nye' 
Golbey, gol'be' 
Gondrecourt, goN'dr'-koor' 
Gondreville, goN'dr'-vel' 
Gorcy, gSr'se' 

Gorizia (or Gorz), go-rTd'ze-a 
Gorgue, La, la' gorg' 
Gorz (or Gorizia), gurts 
Gosselies, gos'le' 
Gouvy, goo've' 
Gouy, gwe 
Gradisca, gra-d£s'ka 
Grado, gra'do 
Graide, grad 
Graincourt, graN'koor' 
Grammont, gra'moN' 
Grandfontaine, graN'foN'teV 
Grand Pre, graN' pra' 
Grandvoir, gra.M'vwa' 
Granges, graNzh 
Graty, gra'te' 
Gravelines, grav'len' 
Gravelotte, grav'lot' 
Grembergen, grem'bgr-g?n 
Grenay, gre'nS' 
Greux, gru 

Grevenmacher, gra'v?n-maK'er 
Grimnee, graN'na' 
Gruchten, grooic'ten 
Grupont, grii'poN' 
Gueblange, giib'lang-e 
Guebweiler, giib'vl-ler 
Guentrsngen, giin'trang-en 
Guewenheim, gii'v?n-him 
Guiscard, gez'kar' 
Guise, gUez' 
Gulpen, gool'pen 
Gumbinnen, gd6m-btn'?n 
Gundolsheim, gd6n'do!z-hIm 
Gussainville, gii'saVvel' 

Habay-la-Vieille, a'bc'-la'-ve'a'y' 

Hablainville, a'blaN'vel' 

Habonville, a'boN'vel' 

Hachy, a'she' 

Hadol, a'do' 

Hadonville, a'doVvel' 

Hacht, haxt 

Haesdonck, hiis'donk 

Hal. hal 

Hallaer, hal-lar' 

Hallainville, a'laN'vel' 

Hailing, hiil'ing 

Halma, hal'ma 

Halsdorf, halz'dorf 

Hamah, hii'ma 

Hamme, ham'e 

Kamoir, a'mwii' 

Hamonville, am'SN'vel' 

Han, han 

Hannapes, a'niip' 

Hanret, aVra' 

Haraucourt, a'ro'koor' 

Harcigny, ar'se'nye' 

Hargicourt, ar'zhe'koor' 

Hargnies, ar'nye' 

Harlebeke, har'le-ba'ke 

Harmignies, ar'me'nye' 

Harnes, arn 

Harre, ar 

Harville, ar'vel' 

Hary, a're' 

Hasnon, as'noN' 

Haspres, as'pr' 

Hastiere, as'tyar' 

Hatrize, a'trez' 

Haubourdine, o'boor'den' 

Haudemont, od'moN' 

Haussy, o'se' 

Hautchin, o'shaN' 

Haut Fays, 5' fe' 

Hautmont, o'ihon' 

Havangen, ha'fang-?n 

Havay, a'vg' 

360 



Havre (Fr. Le Havre), hii'ver ; Fr. le 

av'r' 
Hayange (or Hayingen), a'yaNzh' 
Hayingen (or Havange), hl'Ing-en 
Hazebrouck, az'brook' 
Heer, bar 

Heiderschied, hT'der-shet 
Heimbach, hlm'baK 
Heimsbrunn, hTmz'broon 
Heinerschied, hl'ner-shet 
Helene, a'lgn' 

Helgoland (or Heligoland). hgl'gS-lant 
Hellebeeg, hgl'e-baK 
Hellemmes, Sl'gm' 
Hem, aN 
Henin, a'naV 
Hennemont, en'moN' 
Henripont, aN're'poN' 
Herbesthal, hgr'bez-tal 
Herbeumont, er'bu'moN' 
Herbeviller, erb've'la' 
Herchies, gr'she' 
Herent, ha'rcnt 
Herenthals, ha'ren-tals 
Herenthout, ha'r?nt-out 
Hergarlen, hgr'gar-len 
Hergenrath, her'gtn-rat 
Hergnies, er'nye' 
Hericourt, a're'koor' 
Heristal (or Herstal), a're'stal' 
Hermies, gr'me' 
Herrines, e'ren' 
Herseux, gr'sfi' 
Hersin, gr'saN' 
Herstal (or Heristal), hgr'stal 
Herzegovina, hgr'tsg-g6-ve'na 
Herzheim, herts'hlm 
Hesdin, gs'daN' 
Hestrud, gs'trii' 
Heuclun, u'shaN' 
Heudicourt, u'de'koor' 
Heusweiler, hoiz'vl-ler 
Heusy, u'se' 
Heverle, a'ver'la' 
Heyst, hist 

Hinckange, hen'kang-e 
Hinges, aNzh 
Hirson, er'soN' 
Hives, ev 
Hody, 6'de' 
Hofen, ho'fen 
Hoffeld, ho'fglt 
Hogne, on'y' 
Hollebeke, hol'e-ba'ke 
Hollenthal, hol'en-tal 
Hollerich, hSl'gr-iK 
Holluin, 6'1w5n' 
Holsbeek, holz'bak 
Hombeek, hom'bak 
Homecourt, 6'ma'koor' 
Hompre, oN'pr' 
Hon, 6n 

Hondschoote, hond'sho-te 
Hooglede, ho'gla-de 
Horodenka, ho'rS-dSo'ka 
Horpmael, horp'mal 
Koudain, oo'd3N' 
Houdremont, ou'dr'-moN' 
Houplines, oop'Ien' 
Hcux, 60 
Houyet, oo'vg' 
Huiron, we'roN' 
Huldenberg, ho'bl'den-bgrK 
Huppaye, U'pa' 
Huy, hoi 

Ichteghem, TK'te-ggm 
Iddergem, Id'er-ggm 
Idria, e'drS-a 
Igny, e'nye' 
Illangen, el'2ng-?n 
Illy, e'ye' 
Incourt, aN'koor' 
Inden, Tn'd?n 

Ingelmunster, In'ggl-mun'ster 
Ire, er 

Iseghem, Tz'e-ggm 

Iskanderun (or Alexandretta), is-kan'- 
dgi-oon 



Pronunciation of War Names 



Ismailia, es'ma-el'ya 
Itegem, Tt'e-gem 
Itterboek, Tt'er-bak 
Ittre, e'tr' 

Ivangorod, e-van'go-rot 
Izel, e'zSl 
Izier, e'zya' 

Jabbeke, yab'a-ke 

Jallet, zha'lg' 

Jamagne, zha'man'y' 

Jamboll (or Yamboli), yam'b3-le 

Jametz, zha'mes' 

Jamoignes, zha'mwan'y' 

Jarny, zhar'ne' 

Jaroslaw (or Jaroslau), ya-ros'laf 

JarviUe, zhar'vel' 

Jassy (or Yassy), yas'e 

Jaulny, zhol'ne' 

Jeandelize, zhaN'de-lez' 

Jeantes, zhaNt 

Jedda (or Jidda), jgd'd 

Jehay, zhe-g' 

Jemappe, zhg-map' 

Jenlain, zhaN'laN' 

Jerusalem (or El Kuds), je-roo'sd-lgm 

Jeumont, zhQ'moN' 

Jidda (or Jedda), jld'd 

Jodoigne, zho'dwan'y' 

Jceuf, zhu'iif 

Joncherey, zhoN'she-rg' 

Jonville, zhoN'vel' 

Jouarre, zhoo'ar' 

Junglinster, y66ng'lin-ster 

Juniville, zhii'ne'vel' 

Juprelle, zhii'prgl' 

Jurbise, zhiir'bez' 

Juseret, zhii'se-ra' 

Juvigny, zhii've'nye' 

Juville, zhii'vel' 

Kain, kaN 

Kaisarieh (or Kaisariyeh or Caesarea), 

kl'sa-re'yg 

Kaisersberg, kl'zers-bgrK 
Kalisz, ka'lyesh 
Kail, kal 

Karahissar, ka-ra'hTs-sar' 
Kattecherberg, kat'e-cher-bgre' 
Kattenhofen, kat'cn-ho'fen 
Kedange, ka'dSng-S 
Keltsy (or Kielce), kySl'tsY 
Kelz, kelts 
Kemmel, k?m'el 
Kemplicn, kSmp'llK 
Kerbela, kgr'bg-la 
Kerling, kgr'llng 
Kessel, kgs'el 
Keyem, ki'Sm 
Kholm, Kolm 
Khotin, Ko'tyen 
Kief (or Kiev), ke'ygf 
Kielce (or Keltsy), kygl'tsS 
Kishinef (or Kishinev), ke-she-nygf 
Klagenfurt, kla'g?n-f6ort 
Klausen, klou'zen 
Kleinh.au, klln'hou 
Koekelberg, koo'krl-bgrK 
Kohlscheid, kol'shit 
Kolomea, ko'lo-ma'a 
Kommern, kom'ern 
Kbnigsberg, ku'niKs-bgrK 
Kovel, ko'vgl-y' 
Kragojevatz (or Kraguyevatz), kra- 

goo'yg-vats 
Krainberg, krln'bgric 
Krakow (or Cracow), kra'ko 
Krath. kriit 

Krautscheid, krout'shTt 
Kremenchug (or Krementchug), krgm'- 

gn-chd6k' 

Kremnitz, krgm'nlts 
Kreuzau, kroi'tsou 
Kronenberg, kro'nen-bgrK 
Kuds, El (or Jerusalem), gl koodz 
Kur (or Kura, river), koor; koo'ra 
Kurisches Half, koo'rTsh-gs haf 
Kustendje (or Constanta), kiis-tgn'je 
Kut-el-Amara, koot'fl-a-ma'ra 



La Bassee, la' ba'sa' 

La Capelle, la' ka'pel' 

La Chapelle, la' sha'pel' 

Ladeuze, la'duz' 

La Fere, la' far' 

La Fere-Champenoise, la' far'-shiiN'- 

pe-nwaz' 

La Ferte-Gaucher, la' fer'ta'-go'sha' 
La_ Fert6-sous-Jouarre, la' fer'ta' 

soo'-zhoo'ar' 
Lagarde, la'giird' 
Lagny, la'nye' 
La Gorgue, la' gorg' 
Laibach, ll'bax 
Laires, lar 
Laison, la'zoN' 
Laix, la 

La Laterne, la' la'tgrn' 
Lamarche, la'marsh' 
Lamorteau, la'mor'to' 
Landrecies, laN'dra'se' 
Landres, laN'dr' 
Laneffe, la'ngf 
Langemarck. lao'ge-mark' 
Langres, laN'gr' 
Languion, laN'ge'oN' 
Lannoy, la'nwa' 
Laon, Ki'n 
La Panne, la' pan' 
La Pinte, la' pSm' 
La Roche, la' rosh' 
Latakia, lii'ta-ke'a 
Latisana, la'te-sa'na 
La Trouche, la' troosh' 
Laumesfeld, lou'm?z-fglt 
Lautenbach Zell, lou't?n-baK tsel' 
Laveline, lav'len' 
Laventie, la'vaN'te' 
Lavoir, la'vwa' 
La Voivre, la' vwa'vr' 
Lebbeke, le-ba'ke 
Le Cateau, le ka'to' 
Ledeberg, la'de-bgrK 
Ledeghem, la'de-ggm 
Leeuw, la'oo 
Legnago, la-nya'g5 
Le Havre, le av'r' 
Leidenborn, lT'den-born 
Le Mans, le maN' 
Lembecq, laN'bek' 
Lemberg (or Lw6w), lcmbgrK 
Lendmara, land-ma'ra 
Lens, laNs 
Levico, la've-ko 
Le Quesnoy, le ka'nwa' 
Liancourt, le'aN'koor' 
Liart, le'ar' 
Libau, le'bou 
Lichtenborn, l!K't?n-born 
Lichtervelde, lik'ter-vel'de 
Liederkerke, le'der-ker'ke 
Liege, le'ezh' 
Lienz, le-gnts' 
Lierneux, le'er'nu' 
Lierre, le'ar' 
Liessies, le'es'e' 
Ligne, len'y' 
Ligneville, len'y'-vel' 
Ligny, le'nye' 

Ligny-en-Barrois, le'nye'-aN'-ba'rwa' 
LiUe (or Lisle), lei 
Llllers, le'lar' 

Limburg, lim'burK ; Eng. Hm'bQrg 
Limey, le'me' 
Linden, lTn'dffn 
Linne, lin 

Lironville, le'roN'vel' 
Livenza (river), le-vgnt'sa 
Liverdun, le'ver'duN' 
Lixieres, le'zyar' 
Locon, 16'koN' 
Lodz (or L6d£), lodz ; 156j 
Lommer, ISm'er 
Lommersweiler, lom'erz-vT'ler 
Lomprez, loN'pre' 
Lomza (or Lomzha), lom'zha 
Longarone, lon'ga-ro'na 
Longchamps, loN'shiiN' 
Longeville, loNzh'vel' 



361 



Longlier, loN'lya' 

Longvilly, loN've'ye' 

Longv/y, Ion'vo' 

Lonny, lo'ne' 

Loo, 15 

Loos, 16-os' 

Lophem, lo'pgm 

Lorentzweiler, 15'rPnts-vI'ler 

Lorraine (or Lothringen), lo-ran' 

Lorry, lo're' 

Losheim, loz'hTm 

Lothringen (or Lorraine), lot'nng-en 

Lotzen, lQt'srn 

Louette St. Denis, loo'gf s5n' de-ne' 

Louette St. Pierre, loo'et' s5n' pyar' 

Lougres, loo'gr' 

Louvaigne, loo'vSn'y' 

Louvain, Ioo'vSn' 

Louvignies, loo've'nye' 

Lubey, lii'be' 

Lublin (or Lyublin), lyot/blyen 

Lucheux, lii'shu' 

Lucy, lu'se' 

Liinebach, lii'ne-baK 

Luneville, lii'na'vel' 

Lure, liir 

Lussin, loos-sen' 

Luttange, loot'ang-e 

Lutterbach, 166t'er-baK 

Luttre, lii'tr' 

Lutzk (or Lutsk), lootsk 

Luxembourg, liik'saN'boor' 

Luxemburg, luk'sgm-burg ; Ger. 15oks'- 

em-boorK 
Lwow (or Lemberg), lvoof 
Lys (river), les 

Machecourt, mash'koor' 
Macon, ma'koN' 
Macquenoise, mak'nwaz' 
Magneux, ma'nyu' 
Magnieres, ma'nyar' 
Magny, ma'nye' 
Mainville, mSN'vel' 
Mainz (or Mayence), mints 
Mahrisch-Ostrau, ma'rlsh-Ss'trou 
Maisiers, ma'zyar' 
Maisons-Alfort, ma'zoN'-zal'for' 
Maizeray, maz're' 
Maizy, ma'ze' 
Malamocco, ma'la-mok'ko 
Malatia, ma'la-te'a 
Maldegem, mal'de-gem' 
Malines (or Mechlin), ma'Ien' 
Malo-les-Bains, ma'lo'-la'-bSN' 
Malroy, mal'rwa' 
Malvaux, mal'vo' 
Maizeville, maz'vel' 
Mamers, ma'mar' 
Manage, ma'nazh' 
Mance, miiNs 
Manicamp, ma'ne'kaN' 
Manneren, man'e-ren 
Manonvillers, ma'noN've'lSr' 
Mans, Le, le maN' 
Mantova (or Mantua), man'to-va 
Mantua (or Mantova), man'tO-d 
Marainviller, ma'raN've'ya' 
Marbache, mar'bash' 
Marche, marsh 
Marchiennes, mar'shygn' 
Marchin, mar'shaN' 
Marcinelle, mar'se'ngl' 
Marck, mark 
Marcoing, mar'kwaN' 
Marcq, mark 
Marenne, ma'rgn' 
Maretz, ma'rgs' 
Margival, mar'zhe'val' 
Mariakerke, ma-re'a-ker'ke 
Maricourt, ma're'koor' 
Marienburg, ma-re'?n-bo6rK 
Marieux, ma'ryu' 
Markirch, m'ar'kTrK 
Marlemont, marl'm6N' 
Maries, marl 
Marloie, mar'lwa' 
Marly, mar'le' 
Maroilles, ma'rwa'y' 



Pronunciation of War Names 



Maron, ma'roV 

Marquin, mar'kaN' 

Marsal, miir'zal 

Marseille (or Marseilles), mar'sa'y' 

Marseilles, mar-salz' 

Mars-la-Tour, mars'-la'-toor' 

RIartincourt, mar'taN'koor' 

Marville, mar'vel' 

Massemen, mas'e-men 

Massiges, ma'sezh' 

Maubert-Fontaine, mo'bar'-foN'tSn' 

Maubeuge, mo'buzh' 

Maalds, mold 

Maxenchamp, ma'zaN'shaN' 

Mayence (or Mainz), ma'yaNs' 

Mazee, ma'za' 

Meaux, mo 

Mecca (or Mekka), mek'd 

Mschlin (or Malines), mek'lln 

Medernach, ma'der-naK 

Medina, ma-de'na 

Meerssen, mar'sen 

Mekka (or Mecca), mSk'd 

Melle, mgl 

Mellier, mel'ya' 

Melreux, mel'rii' 

Melun, me-luN' 

Membruggen, mgm'br66g-?n 

Menin, me-naN' 

Menil, me-nel' 

Menil-la-Tour, me-nel'-la'-t6or' 

Merbecque, mgr'bek' 

Merbes, merb 

Merchtem, mgrK'tem 

Mercken, mer'kcn 

Mercy-le-Bas, mer'se'-lS-ba' 

Mercy-le-Haut, mSr'se'-le-o' 

Merlemont, merl'moN' 

Mersch, mersh 

Merval, mer'val' 

Merville, mer'vel' 

Messancy, me-saVse' 

Messein, me-saN' 

Messines, me-sen' 

Mestre, mes'tra 

Metaires, ma'tar' 

Metnitz, met'mts 

Metrich, met'rTK 

Mettecoven, met'e-ko'fen 

Metz, mets ; Fr. mes 

Metzeral, met'se-ral 

Metzerwiese, met'ser-ve'ze 

Meulebeke, mG'le-ba'ke 

Meuse (river), mQz ; Eng. muz 

Mezieres, ma'zyar' 

Mirwart, mer'vart 

Mitrovicza {or Mitrovitz), me'tro-vet'sa 

Moerbeke, moor'ba-ke 

Moerkerke, moor'ker-ke 

Moere, moo're 

Moggio, mod'jo 

Mohammera, m6'hd-ma'ra 

Mohiville, mo'e'vel' 

Mohon, moW 

Moircy, mwar'se' 

Moldava (river), mol-da'va 

Molhain, mo'laN' 

Monastir, mon'ds-ter' 

Monceau, moN'ko' 

Moncel, moN'sel' 

Monchy, moN'she' 

Mondelange, mon'de-lang'e 

Monfalcone, mon'fal-ko'na 

Mons, moNs 

Mons-en-Pevele, moN'-z'aN'-pa'val' 

Mont, m8N 

Montagnana, mon'ta-nya'na 

Montbeliard, moN'ba'lyar' 

Montdidier, moN-'de'dya' 

Montfaucon, moN'fS'koN' 

Montherme, moN'term' 

Monthureux, moN'tU'rG' 

Montigny, moN'te'nye' 

Montjoie, moN'jwa' 

Montmedy, moN'ma'de' 

Montmirail, moN'me'ra'y' 

Montoise, moN'twaz' 

Montreau Vieux, mSN'tro'vyu' 

Mont-St.-Amand, m5>.''-saN'-ta'maN' 



Mont-St.-Aubert, moN'-saN'-to'Mr' 

Mont-St.-Eloy, moN'-saN'-ta'lwa' 

Mont-St.-Jean, moN'-saN'-zhaN' 

Mont-St.-Martin, moM'-sax'-mar'taN' 

Mont-St.— Pierre moN'-saN'-pyar' 

Mont-St.-Remy, moN'-saN'-ra'me' 

Montsec, moN'sek' 

Moorslede, mors'la-de 

Moreuil, mo'ru'y' 

Morey, mo'rg' 

Moriville, mo're'vel' 

Morville, mor'vel' 

Mosul, mo'sool' 

Mouaville, moo'a'vel' 

Mouchin, moo'shaN' 

Moulbaix, mool'be' 

Moulins, moo'laN' 

Mouscron, moos'kr6N' 

Moustier, moos'tya' 

Mouvaux, moo'vo' 

Mouzay, moo'zg' 

Moyen, mwa'yaN' 

Moyenmoutier, mwa'yaN'moo'tya' 

Moyenneville, mwa'yen'vel' 

Mozet, mo'zg' 

Muggia, mood'ja 

Mulhausen, mul'hou'zen 

Minister, miin'ster 

Murville, mUr'vel' 

Mush, moosh 

Musson, mii'zoN' 

Muysen, moi'sen 

Muzeray, mii'ze-rg' 

Nadrin, na'draN' 

Nakhitchevan, na'ke-chg-van' 

Nampteuil. naN'tu'y' 

Namur, na'miir' 

Nancy, naN'se' ; Eng. nan'sl 

Nandrin, naVdraN' 

Narew (or Narev, river), nii'rgf 

Nassogne, na'son'y' 

Nazareth, (Belgium) na'za'rgt' 

Nermig, nen'lK 

Nesle, nal 

Neubois, nu'bwa' 

Neuenburg, noi'Fn-bo6rK 

Neufchateau, nG'sha'to' 

Neufchatel, nu'?ha't£l' 

Neufchef, nu'shef 

Neuilly-sur-Marne, nu've'-sur'-marn' 

Neumarkt, noi'miirkt 

Neutitschein, noi'tTt'shTn 

Keuve Chapelle, nuv' sha'pel' 

Neuve Eglise, nuv' a'gltV 

Neuve Maison, nuv' ma'zflN' 

Neuves Maisqns, nuv ma'z6N' 

Neuville, nfl'vel' 

Neuweiler, noi'vT-ler 

Niekirchen, ne'ker'uen 

Kiel, nel 

Nieuport, ne'oo-port 

Nikolaief (or Nikolayev), nye'ko-la'ytf 

Nirnes (or Nismes), nem 

Ninove, ne'nov' 

Nivelles, ne'vel' 

Nives, nev 

Noordange, noor'dang-e 

Noirefontaine, nwar'foN'tSn' 

Noirval, nwar'val' 

Noisy-le-Sec, nwa'ze'-le-sek' 

Noreuil, no'ru'y' 

Norroy-le-Sec, no'rwii'-le-sSk' 

Norvenich, nor'fe-niK 

Nouzon, noo'zoN' 

Noville, no'vel' 

Novogeorgievsk, n6'vo-gg-6r'ge-yefsk 

Noyelle, nwa'yel' 

Noyen, nwa'yaN' 

Obaix, o'ba' 
Oberbruck, o'ber-brooK 
Cbersgegen, o^berz-ga'gen 
Ober-Weiler, o'ber-vl'ler 
Ober-Weiss, o'ber-vls' 
Occoches, 6'kosh' 
Ochamps, S'shaN' 
Octringen, ok'trlng'en 
Oderen, o'de-ren 



Oderzo, 5-d5rt'so 

Oedelem. oo'de-lgm 

Offey, 6'fg' 

Ogeviller, ozh've'ya' 

Ogy, S'zhe' 

Ohain, 6'5n' 

Ohey, 6'e' 

Oignies, wa'nye' 

Oise (river), waz 

Oisy, wa'ze' 

Ollignies, 6'le'nye' 

Olloy, S'lwa' 

Olmiitz, 61'miits 

Olzheim, olts'hTm 

Omicour.t, 6'me'koor' 

Onnaing t 6'naN' 

Oombergen, 5m'bSr-g?n 

Oostacker, ost'ak'er 

Oostcamp, ost'kamp' 

Oostkerke, ost'ker-ke 

Opont, o'pon' 

Oppy, 6'pe' 

Orbey, 6r'be' 

Orchies, 6r'she' 

Orchimont, Sr'she'mSN' 

Orcq, 6rk 

Origny, 6're'nye' 

Ornel, Sr'nSl' 

Orsay, or'sg' 

Orsera, or-sa'ra 

Or/al, or'val' 

Ossero, 6s-sa'rS 

Ostiglia, 6s-tel'ya 

Ostrog, os-trox' 

Ostrow, os'trof 

Ottendorf, 6t'en-d6rf 

Ottignies, 6'te'nye' 

Ottingen, 6t'Tng-?n 

Ouchez, oo'sha' 

Oudenarde (or Audenarde), ou'dL 

nar'de 
Oudler, ood'la' 
Ouffet, oo'fa' 
Ouire, wer 
Ourcq (river), oork 
Ourthe (river), oort 

Padova (or Padua), pa'do-va 

Padua (or Padova), pad'u-d 

Pagny, pa'nye' 

Pagnies, pa'nye' 

Pago, pii'go 

Paliseul, pa'le'sul' 

Palmanova, pal'ma-no'va 

Pange, pang'e 

Panne, La, la pan' 

Pannes, pan 

Parenzo, pa-rent'so 

Paris, par'Is ; Fr. pa're' 

Parroy, pa'rwa' 

Pas-de-Calais, pa'-de-ka'lg' 

Passchendaele, pas'kgn-da'le 

Patignies, pa'te'nye' 

Pattingen, pat'ing-?n 

Paturages, pa'tu'razh' 

Paxonne, pa'zon' 

Pecq, pek 

Pelingen, pa'lTng-en 

Pellestrina, pel'les-tre'na 

Peltre, pel'tra 

Pepinster, pep'Tn-ster 

Perck, perk 

Peremysl (or PrzemySl), pe-rg'mTshl-y' ; 

pshe'mishl-y' 
Perl, perl 
Pernes, pern 
Peronne, pa'ron' 
Perthes, pert 
Peschieia, pa-skya'ra 
Petersbach, pa'terz-baK 
Petingen, pgt'Tng-en 
Petit-Croix, pe-te'-krwa' 
Petit-Magny, pe-te'-ma'nye' 
Petitmont, pe-te'moN' 
Petrokov (or Piotrkow), pyg'tro-kof 
Peuthy, pu'te' 
Peuvillers, pfl've'lar' 
Pfaffenheim, pfaf'?n-hTm 
Pietterhausen, of et'er hou 'zen 



362 



Pronunciation of War Names 



Philippeville, fe'lep'vel' 

Phlin, A5n 

Piacenza, pya-chent'sa 

Piave (river), pya'va 

Picardy, plk'ar-dl 

Pierrefonds, pyar'foN' 

Pierrepont, pyar'p6N' 

Pietro, pyg'tro 

Pieve di Cadore, pyg'va de ka-d6'ra 

Pilken, pll'ken 

Pillon, pe'yoN' 

Pinte, La, la' paNt 

Piotrk6w (or Petrokov), pyotr'kdof 

Piove, pyo'va 

Piraeus, pT-re'us 

Pirano, pe-ra'no 

Pitthem, pit'em 

Plainfaign, plaN'faN' 

Plancher-les-Mines, plaN'sha'-la 



Plasschendaele, plas'kgn-da'le 

Plombieres, ploN'byar' 

Podgorze, pod-goo'zhg 

Poelcapelle, pool'ka'pgl' 

Poitiers, pwa'tya' 

Poix, pwa 

Poix-St.-Hubert, pwa'-saV-tii'bar' 

Pola, po'la 

Polleur, po'lQr' 

Pont-a-Celles, poN'-ta'-sel' 

Pont-a-Marcq, poN'-ta'-mark' 

Pont-a-Mousson, poN'-ta'-moo'zoN' 

Pontebba, pon-teb'ba 

Ponte di Piave, pon'ta de pya'va 

Pontoy, pon'toi 

Pont-Pierre, poN'-pyar' 

Pont-Ste.-Maxence, p 6 n ' - s a n t ' - 
ma'zaNs' 

Pont-sur-Sambre, poN'-siir'-saVbr' 

Poperinghe, po'pe-raNg' 

Pordenone, por'da-no'na 

Portogruaro, por'to-grdo-a'ro 

Portole, por'to-la 

Portore, por'tS-ra 

Port Said, port sa-ed' 

Potteaux, pS'to' 

Pozieres, pS'zyar' 

Predazzo, pra-dat'so 

Pripet, pre'pet 

Prisrend, pre'zrgnt 

Profondeville, prS'foNd'vel' 

Promontore (cape), pro'mon-to'ra 

Pronsfeld, prSnz'felt 

Proskurof (or Proskurov), pro'skoo-rof 

Proven, pro'ven 

Provencheres, pro'vaVshar' 

Provin, pro'vaN' 

Prum, proom 

Pl'llth (river), proot 

Przasnysz, pshas'nlsh 

Przsmysl (or Peremysl), pshg'mlshl y' 

Pulnoy, piil'nwa' 

Pultusk, pool'toosk 

Pusgemange, piis'maNzh' 

Piittlingen, piit'llng-en 

Puxieux, pu'zyu' 

Quareux, ka'rfl' 
Quarnero, kwiir-na'ro 
Quartes, kart 
Quatre-Bras, ka'tr'-brii' 
Quesnoy, Le, le ka'nwa' 
Quevaucamps, ke-vo'kiiN' 
Quievrain, ke'e-vraN 
Quievy, ke'e-ve' 

Raddon, ra'doN' 
Radmaunsdorf, rad'mounz-dorf 
Radom, ra'dom 
Radzivilov, rad'ze've-lof 
Raeren, ra'ren 

Rambervillers, raVbgr've'lar' 
Rambruch, ram'broojc 
Ramecourt, ram'koor' 
Ramet, ra'ma' 
Ramillies, ra'me'ye' 
Ramonchamps, ra'moN'shaN' 
Ramont, ra'moN' 
Ranee, raNs 



Ranconniere, raN'ko'nvar' 
Raon, raN 

Raon-1'Etape, raV-la'tap' 

Rappoltsweiler, rap'olts-vT'ler 

Rastenburg, ras'tcn-boonc' 

Raucourt, ro'koor' 

Raulecourt, rSl'koor' 

Raulseur, rol'sQr' 

Rava (or Rawa), ra'va 

Raves, rav 

Raville, ra'vel' 

Ravnagora, rav'na-go'ra 

Rawaruska, ra'va-roos'ka 

Rechingen, reic'Tng-en 

Recogne, re'kon'y' 

Redu, re'dii' 

Regnieville, rg'nye'vel' 

Rehainviller, ra'aN've'ya' 

R§han, ra'SN' 

Reichlange, rlK'lang-S 

Reims (or Rheims), remz; Fr. raNs 

Reisdorf , riz'dorf 

Releghein, rgl'e-gem 

Remagne, re-man'y' 

Remaucourt, ra'mo'koor' 

Remich, ra'miK 

Remiremont, re-mer'moN' 

Remy, ra'me' 

Renaix, re-ng' 

Renland, ran'lant 

Renlies, raVIe' 

Renwez, raVva' 

Repaix, re-pg' 

Resteigne, res'tgn'y' 

Rethel, re-tel' 

Reuland, roi'lant 

Revin, re-vaN' 

Rezonville, re-zoN'vel' 

Rheims (or Reims), remz ; Fr. raNs 

Ribecourt, reb'koor' 

Ribemont, reb'moN' 

Richterich, nK'te-riK 

Riempst, rempst 

Rienne, re'en' 

Riga, re'ga 

Rigny, re'nye' 

Rimbach, rem'bh'K 

Rimogne, re'mon'y' 

Rinnthal, nn'tal 

Riviere, re'vyar' 

Robecq, ro'bgk' 

Robechies, rob'she' 

Robelmcnt, ro'bSl'moN' 

Roche, La, la' rosh' 

Rochefort, rosh'for' 

Rochehaut, rosh'o' 

Rochesson, rosh'soN' 

Roclincourt, ro'klaN'koor' 

Rocroi, ro'krvva' 

Rodemachern, ro'de-maic'ern 

Roeux, rS'u' 

Roisel, rwa'zgl' 

Roly, ro'le' 

Rombas, rom'bas 

Roncq, roNk 

Roobors, ro'bors 

Rorbach, ror'baK 

RosSe, ro'za' 

Rosieres, ro'zvar' 

Rosieres-en-Santerre, ro'zyar'-skV- 

sa'N'tar' 
Rossart, ro'sar' 
Rotgen, rot'gen 
Rothau, ro'tou 
Roubaix, roo'be 
Rouen, rwaN 
Rouffach, roo'fa'K 
Rougemont, roozh'moN' 
Roulers, roo'la' 
Roupy, roo'pe' 
Rousbrugge, rous'br66g-e 
Rouves, roov 
Rouvres, roo'vr' 
Rouvrois, roov'rwa' 
Rouvroy, roov'rwa' 
Roux, roo 

Roverbella, ro'vgr-bgl'la 
Roveredo, ro'va-ra'do 

363 



Rovigno, ro-ve'nyo 

Rovigo, ro-ve'go 

Royaumeix, rwa'yo'me' 

Roye, rwa 

Rozoy-sur-Serre, ro'zwa'-sur'-sar' 

Rozzo, rod'zo 

Ruddervoorde, rud'er-vor'de 

Rudlin, riid'laN' 

Rulles, riil 

Rumbeke, rum'ba-ke 

Rumes, riim 

Rumigny, rii'me'nye' 

Rupt, riip 

Russen, rus'en 

Rzeszow, zhg'shoof 

Saar (river), zar 
Saarbriicken, ziir'bruk'gn 
Saarburg, zar'bdorK 
Sablon, sa'bloN' 
Sachsenburg, sak'sen-boorK 
Sacile, sa-che'la 
Saied, sa^fed' 
Saffelaere, saf'e-la're 
Saida, sa'e-da. 
Sains, sSn 

Sains-Richmont, sSn' -resli'mcV 
Saint-Amand, saN'ta'maN' 
Saint-Benoit, saN'-be-nwa' 
Saint-Blaize, saN'-blaz' 
Saint-Bresson, saN'-brt-soN' 
Saint-Cyr, saN'-ser' 
Saint-Denis, saN'-de-ne' 
Saint-Die, saN'-dya' 

Saint-Btienne, saN'-ta'tvgn' 
Saintes, saNt 

Saint-Genest, saN'-zhe-ne' 
Saint-Georges, saN'-zhorzh' 
Saint-Gerard, saN'-zha'rar' 
Saint-Germain, saN'-zher'mSN' 
Saint-Ghislain, saM'-gts'laN' 
Saint-Gilles, saN'-zbel' 
Saint-Hilaire, saN'-te'lSr' 
Saint-Hubert, saN'-tU'bar' 
Saint-Jean, saN'-zhaN' 
Saint-Josse-ten-Woode, sSN'-zhSs* 

taN'-nod' 

Saint- Julien, saN'-zh ii '1 yS x' 
Saint-Laurent, saN'16'ra'N' 
Saint-L§ger, saN'-la'zha' 
Saint-Leonard, saN'-la'6'n.V 
Saint-Marcel, saN'-mar'sel' 
Sainte-Marguerite, saNt'-mar'; E cet' 
Sainte-Marie, saNt'-ma'rG' 
Saint-Martin, saN'-mar'taN' 
Saint-Maurice, saN'-mo'res' 
Saint-Medard, saN'-me-riar' 
Saint-Michel, saN'-me'shri' 
Saint-Mihiel, saN'-me'vel' 
Saint-Nabord, saN'-na'bor' 
Saint-Nicholas, saN'-ne'ko'la' 
Saint-Omer, siN'-to'mar' 
Saint-Ouen, saN'-twaN' 
Saint-Paul, saN'-pol' 
Saint-Pierre, saV-pyar' 
Saint-Pol, saN'-pol' 
Saint-Privat, sSN'-pre'va' 
Saint-Quentin. saN'-ka'N'taN' 
Saint-Remy, saN'-re-me' 
Saint-Simon, saN'-se'moN' 
Saint-Sulpice, saN'-siil'pes' 
Saint-Trond, saN'-trox' 
Saini-Venant, saN'-ve-naN' 
Sainville, sSN'-vel' 
Saleux, sa'lu' 

Saloniki (or Salonica), sa'Io-ne'kc 
Salvoie, sal-vo'ra 
Sambre (river), saN'br' 
Samree, saN'ra' 
San (river), san 
Sancourt, saN'koor' 
San Giorgio, san jor'jo 
Santeuil, saN'tu'y' 
San Pietro, san pva'tro 
Sapogne, sa'pon'v' 
Sappois-le-Bas," sa'pwa'-le-ba' 
Sappois-le-Haut, sa'pwa'-le-6' 
San Vito, san ve'to 



Pronunciation of War Names 



Sarajevo (or Sarayevo), sa'ra-y£-v6 

Sarifa, sa-re'fa 

Sart, sar 

Sarthe (river), sart 

Saulnes, son 

Saulnot, so'no' 

Sauvigny, so've'nye' 

Saulxures, so'liir' 

Save (river), sav 

Saventhem, sa'ven-tgm 

Schaerbeek, sicar'bak 

Scheven, sica'v?n 

Schifflingen, shTFlTng-en 

Schio, ske'5 

Schirmeck, sher'mgk 

Schleiden, shll'd?n 

Schmidtheim, shmTt'hTm 

Schoenecken, sK6o'nek-?n 

Schbneberg, shfi'ne-berK 

Schooten, sKo'ten 

Schopp, shop 

Schnerlach, shrer'liiK 

Scutari (or Skutari), skoo'ta-re 

Seclin, se-klaN' 

Sedan, se-daN' 

Segelsem, sa'g?I-s?m 

Seicheprey, sesh'prS' 

Seine (river), san 

Selbach, zal'baK 

Seloignes, se-lwan'y' 

Senefie, se-ngf 

Senlis, sSN'les' 

Senon, sa'noN' 

Sentheim, zant'hlm 

Seny, se-ne' 

Seraing, se-raN' 

Seres, sSr'gs 

Sereth (river), si-ret' 

Serres, sar 

Servance, sgr'vaNs' 

Servigny, sgr've'nye' 

Seuil, sfl'y' 

Sevran, se-vTaN' 

Sezanne, sa'zan' 

Sibret, se'bra' 

Sichen, slic'en 

Siedlce (or Syedlets), shgl'tsg 

Sierck, zerk 

Signy-l'Abbaye, se'nye'-la'ba' 

Signy-le-Petit, se'nye'-le-pe-te' 

Silenrieux, se'laN'ryti' 

Sillegny, se'le'nye' 

Silly, se'ye' 

Simmerath, zlm'e-rat 

Sin, sa.\ 

Sinay, se'ng' 

Sinob (or Sinope), se-n&V 

Sinope (or Sinob), st-no'pe 

Sinsin, sSn'sSn' 

Sinspelt, zenz'pglt 

Sirault, se'ro' 

Sivas, se'vas' 

Sivry, se'vre' 

Skoplje (or Uskiip), skop'lyg 

Skutari (or Scutari), skoo'ta-re 

Sleydinge, sli'dlnge 

Slype, slep 

Snaeskerke, snas'ker-ke 

Sochaux, so'sho' 

Sofia (or Sophia), so'fS-a ; so-fe'a 

Sohier, so'e'a' 

Soignies, swa'nye' 

Soire, swar 

Soissons, swa's8N' 

Sokolof (or Sokolow), so'k8-lof 

Solbach, zol'baK 

Solesmes, s8'Iam' 

Sologne, sS'lon'y' 

Somain, sS'maN' 

Sombrin, soN'braN' 

Somergem, sS'mer-gem 

Somme (river, department), s<5m 

Sommerviller, sS'mSr've'ya' 

Somzee, soN'za' 

Soppe, zSp'e 

Sorcy, sor'se' 

Sotenich, zo'te-niK 

Sottegem, sot'e-ggm 



Souain, soo'Sn' 
Souilly, swe'ye' 
Soulosse, soo'los' 
Soultzbach, zoults'baK 
Soultzmatt, zoults'mat 
Soumagne, soo'man'y' 
Soumay, soo'mg' 
Soupir, soo'per' 
Sourbrodt, zour'brot 
Sourvoy, soor'vwii' 
Spilimbergo, spe'lem-bgr'go 
Spincourt, spaN'koor' 
Spittal, shplt'al 
Spy, spe 
Staple, sta'pl' 
Staufen, shtou'f?n 
Steenbrugge, stan'broftg'e 
Steenvoorde, stan'vor-de 
Steige, shtl'ge 
Sterrebeek, ster'e-bak 
Stettin, shtg-ten' 
Stosswihr, shtos'ver 
Stoumont, stoo'moN' 
Straimont, stre'moN' 
Stralsund, shtral'zotmt 
Stree, stra 
Strigno, stre'nyo 
Struma (river), stroo'ma 
Stryj, stre'y' 
Sugny, sii'nye' 
Suippes, swep 
Suwalkl, s<56-val'ke 
Sweveghem, swa've-ggm 
Swevezeele, swa've-za'le 
Swinemiinde, sve'ne-miin'de 
Syedlets (or Siedlce), syed'lygts 

Tabriz, ta-brez' 

Tahure, ta'iir' 

Taintrux, taN'trii' 

Tarcento, tar-chen'to" 

Tarcienne, tar'syeV 

Tarnopol, tar-no'pol-y' 

Tarnow, tar'noof 

Tavaux, ta'vS' 

Tavigny, ta've'nye' 

Tchatalja (or Chatalja), chii-tal'ja 

Tchernavoda (or Cernavoda), chgr'na- 

vo'da 
Tellancourt, te-laN'koor' 
Tellin, te-laN' 
Templeuve, taN'pluv' 
Tentre, taN'tr' 
Termes, term 

Termonde(or Dendermonde), tgr'moNd' 
Ternuay, ter'nii'e' 
Thann, tan 
Thaon, taN 
Thelus, ta'lii' 
Therouanne, ta'roo'an' 
Thezey, ta'ze' 
Thiant, te'aN' 
Thiaucourt, tyS'koor' 
Thiefosse, tye-fSs' 
Thielt, telt 
Thiene, tyg'na 
Tbil, tel 
Thillot, te'yo' 

Thionville (or Diedenhofen), tyoN'vel' 
Thirimont, te're'moN' 
Thourout, too'roo' 
Thuin, tii'aN' 
Tillet, tg'ya' 
Tincourt, taN'koor' 
Tirlemont, ter'l'moN' 
Tolmezzo, tol-met'so 
Tomasof (or Tomaszow), to-mli'solif 
Tongres, toN'gr' 
Tourcoing, toor'kwSN' 
Tournay (or Tournai), toor'na' 
Traubach, trou'baK 
Trenchiennes, traN'shygn' 
Trebizond, treb'i-zond' 
Tregnano i tra-nyii'no 
Trelon, tra'lon' 
Triaucourt, tre'o'koor' 
Treviso, tra-ve'z5 
Trieste (or Triest), tre-ust' 
Trieux, tre'u' 



364 



Trouche, La, la' troosh' 
Turkheim, toork'hlm 

Uberstrasse, ii'ber-shtras'e 

Udine, oo'de-na 

Ugny, ii'nye' 

Umago, 60-ma'go 

Unie (or Unieh), ii-ne'e 

Urbach, oor'baK 

Urbeis, oor'bls 

Urfa, oor'fa' 

Urmatt, oor'mat 

Urmiah (or Urmia, Urumiah), oor'me'a 

Uriel, oor'el 

Uruffe, u'ruf 

Uskiip (or Uskiib, Skoplje), iis-kiip' 

Vacquerie, vaTte-re' 

Vagney, va'nye' 

Valenciennes, va'laN'sySn' 

Valhey, val'e' 

Valjevo (or Valyevo), val'ya-vo 

Valmerangen, val'me-rang'en 

Valmy, val'me' 

Vance, vSns 

Vancouleurs, viiN'koo'lur' 

Vandieres, vaN'dyar' 

Vannes, van 

Vardar (river), var'dar' 

Varennes-en-Argonne, va'rSn'-zaN'- 

ar'gon' 

Vaucourt, vo'koor' 
Vaudemont, vod'mSN' 
Vaux, vo 

VeCOUX, va'koo' 

Veglia, va'lya 

Veiving, fl'fTng 

Velaines, ve-lan' 

Velasnes, ve-lan' 

Vellerois, vSl'rwa' 

Vellescot, vel'sk6' 

Vend6e, vaN'da' 

Vendegies, vaNd'zhe' 

Vendin, vaN'daN' 

Venezia (or Venice), va-n?t'sya 

Venice (or Venezia), vgn'is 

Vennezey, vgn'zS' 

Ventron, vaN'troN' 

Verdenal, vgrd'nal' 

Verdun, vgr'duN' 

Vermand, vgr'maN' 

Verneuil, ver'nfl'y' 

Verona, ve-ro'nd ; It. va-ro'na 

Versailles, vgr'sa'y' ; Eng. vgr-salz' 

Verviers, vgr'vyar' 

Vervins, vgr'vaN' 

Verzy, vgr'ze' 

Viaden, ve'a-d?n 

Vicenza, ve-chgnt'sa 

Vigneulles, ve'nyul' 

Villafranca, vel'la-fran'ka 

Villemontoire, vel'moN'twar' 

Villers-Bretonneux, ve'lar'-bre-tS'nQ' 

Villers-Cotterets, vg'lar'-kS'te-rg' 

Villers-la-Ville, ve'lar'-la'-vel' 

Villerupt, v^l'riip' 

Villiers, ve'ya' 

Vilvorde, vel'vord' 

Vimy, ve'me' 

Vincey, vSN'sg' 

Vireux, ve'ru' 

Vistula (or Weichsel), vls'tu-ld 

Vitrimont, ve'tre'm6N' 

Vitry-en-Artois, ve'tre'-aN'-ar'twa' 

Vitry-le-Francois, ve'tre'-lS-fraN'swa' 

Vittorio, vet-to'rS-o 

Voivre, La, la' vwi'vr' 

Volga, vol'gd ; Russ. vol'ga 

Volhynia, vol-in'I-a 

Volta, vol'ta 

Voorde, vor'de 

Vosges, vozh 

Vottem, v5t^em 

Vouziers, voo'zyar' 

Vy-les-Lure, ve'-la'-liir' 

Wahlesscheid, valgz-shit' 
Walcourt, val'koor' 



Pronunciation of War Names 



Walheim, val'hTm 

Wallers, va'lar' 

Wallendorf, v21'en-d8rf 

Wancennes, vaN'sen' 

Wanlin, vaVlaN' 

Wardill, var'daV 

Warta (or Warthe), viir'te 

Warzee, var'za' 

Wasigny, va'se'n; c' 

Wasmes, vam 

Wasserbillig, vas'er-bil'TK 

Wassigny, va'se'nye' 

Waterloo, wo'ter-loo' ; Du. wa'ter-lo' 

Watigny va'te'nye' 

Watweiler, vSt'vT-ler 

Wavre, vav'r' 

Wavrin, va'vraN' 

Waxweilor, vaks'vl-ler 

Weerde, war'de 

Weerf , warf 

Wehingen, va'hlng-en 



Weichsel (or Vistula), vlk'sel 

Weismes, vlz'm^z 

Weiten, vl'ten 

Weitersweiler, vl'terz-vl'ler 

Wembach, vam'baK 

Werlaing, ver'laN' 

Wervicq, ver'vek' 

Weselberg, va'zgl-b&K 

Wetteren, wet'er-en 

Wibrin, ve'braV 

Wignehles, ven'ye-e' 

Wiltz, velts 

Wintzenheim, vTnt'scn-hTm 

Wizernes, ve'zarn' 

Woel, wool 

Woevre, vo'evV 

Woippy, voi'pe 

Wolmeringen, vol'mer Tng'en 

Woluwe-Saint-Lambert, wol'&-we- 

sfnt-lam'bert 
Worth, vQrt 



Wiirselen, viir'ze-len 

Xammes, zam 
Xaronval, za'roN'val' 
Xertigny, zSr'te'nye' 
Xironcourt, ze'roN'koor' 
Xivry, ze'vre' 
Xures, ziir 

Yassy (or Jassy), yas'e" 

Ypres, e'pr' 

Yser (river), e'sa' 

Yvoir, e'vwar' 

Zabern, tsa'bern 

Zamosk (or Zamosc), zii'mSshch 

Zeebrugge, tsa'broog'e 

Zellenburg, tsgl'cn-boorK 

Zirknitz, tserk'ntts 

Zittau, tstt'ou 

Zloczow, zlS'ch<56f 

Zweibriicken, tsvl'briik'&i 



365 



INDEX 



INDEX 



Abatis 100 Baltic Sea territory. 142, 159, 164 Castor Oil 76 

Abbreviations of honors and Bank Laws Casualties of War 56, 121-125 

orders 152 German 202,203 Catapult 88 

Access to the Sea 35 Barrage 46 Cattle 230,274,281 

Ace 67 Batoum 176,212 Caucasus 176 

Adjutant-General 104 Battalion 104 Cavell, Edith.. 156, 157,332,333 

Admiral 107 Battalion of Death 150 Censorship 294 

Africa 149,226 Battery 105 Central Powers 

proposed agreement.. .270, 271 Battlefields (see Germany and Austria- 
Agriculture 228,229,274,280 cultivation 102 Hungary) 

Aircraft bombing 48, 68 Battles 128-130,296 Chalons 296 

Airplanes 67 to 77 naval 131-135 Charles Francis Joseph 301 

Air raids 70, 75 Battleships (see Warships) Chelmsford, Lord 317 

Alcohol 47, 278,281 Beatty, Sir David 305 Chemin des Dames 128 

Alexandra, Queen 302 Beer 278 Chief of Staff 103 

Alien Draft Bill 238 Belgium Chile 276, 283, 145, 285 

Alien Enemies 3, 239, 293, 322, 323 32, 153-158, 304, 325 to 338 China 115,187, 321 

Allies 2, 139 king 300, 304 Chlorine gas 97 

armies 147 Map showing Franco-Ger- Chronology 341 to 351 

cost of war • 197 man frontier. ..Plate IV Civilians 151 

Alsace-Lorraine 32, 166 Belligerent acts 5, 136 Clemenceau, Georges 312 

Map Plate VII Berlin 140, 212 Coal 176, 209, 210, 284 

Ambassadors and Ministers.. 317 Berlin-Bagdad Railroad Coast defense 85 

America (see United States) 192, 267, 268, 271 Coffee 229 

American Federation of Bernhardi, General 309 Colliers 82 

Labor 319 Bessarabia ,167 Commerce 

American Library Association 299 Bethmann-Hollweg, Dr. T. .. 310 (see trade) 

American republics in war.. 4 Big Bertha 88 Commissioned officers. . .105, 106 

American inventions.. 87 Birth rate 247 Communication line 53 

Ancona 9 Blighty 101 Communication trench 102 

Anglo-German Hague Con- Blimps 74 Company 103 

ference 119 Boches 225 Company clerk 51 

Anti-aircraft guns 73 Bolo Pasha 317 Concrete 146,262 

Antwerp 156 Bolsheviki 163,177 Congress of TJ. S 4,28-30 

Anzac 151 Bombs Constantine 301 

Appam case 259 airplane 70, 74 Constanza , 165 

Arabic 9 Bosnia 34 Convoys 5, 54, 146 

Armaments, Limitation of.. 31 Bounties 132,276 Copper 96, 101, 285 

Armenians 168, 169 Bourassa, Henri 318 Corn 229, 275,281 

Armies 50, 103, 104 Bourgeois 178 Corps 53, 106 

Ancient 296 Boycott 319 Cossacks 160 

Austria-Hungary 150 Boy-Ed, Capt 12, 307 Cost 1, 125, 190 to 205 

Canadian 147 Brazil 246 Cotton 90, 91, 210, 287 

French 147 Bread ..227,272 Council of National Defense 292 

German 149 Breech-loading 88 Courland 159, 165 

Great Britain 104,147 Breslau 133 Court Martial 322,323,331 

Russian 128,224 Brest-Litovsk 35,167,183 Crops 228, 229, 274,280 

United States Briand, Aristide 311 Cruisers 79, 85 

5,6,42,56,103,108,231,241 Bridgehead 101 Currency 203 

Map Plate XVII "Brig" 86 Czar of Russia. . .4, 183, 301, 302 

Armistice 38-41,352-354 Brigade 105 Czecho-Slovaks 38 

Armor on ships 85 Browning gun 87, 94 Czernin, Count 36,313 

Artillery Brussels 153,337 Dacia 259 

American 53, 242 Bucharest 268 Dalmatia 

weapons 101,102 Bulgaria 4,202,302 Map, plate VIII 5 

Asia Minor Bulow, Prince 311 Danube 165, 166,266 

Map Plate X Bundesrath 214,221 Dardanelles 128,129,134,136 

territory 192 By-products 207 Daylight Saving 320 

Asquith 310, 317 Cabinet, U. S.... 290 Death penalties 104, 322, 323 

Atrocities 325 to 338 Cadorna, General 307 Death rate 123, 232, 246 

Australia 145, 148,248 Camarilla 181 de Bloch, Jean 317 

Austria-Hungary Cameras Debts 181, 193, 194, 197 

4, 12 32-34, 37, 170 aircraft 72 Declaration of London 6 

army 150 Camouflage 89 Defensive army 50 

Emperor 301 Camps 108 Demobilization 235 

prisoners 119 cantonments 232 Denmark 147,158 

war loan 205 prison 116 Deportation 329 

Austro-Italian frontier Canada Depth-bomb 56 

Map Plate VIII army 147 Deserters 236 

Aviation 67-77,243 casualties 124 Destroyers 54, 81 

Baden-Powell, General 308 plots against 18,19, 23 Destruction 

Baker, Secretary 291 Cannon 88, 91, 95 of ships 252 

Balance of Power 2 Cantonments 232,241 of villages 325 to 338 

Balkans 162,170,171 Plate XVII Deutschland 61,208 

Map Plate IX Carso 129 Devil Dogs 43 

Ballast tanks 63 Cartridges 108 Dictionary of War Names. 357-365 

369 



Index 

Diesel engine 57 prisoners 116 Herzegovina 34 

Dirigibles 71 ships 263 Hindenburg, General 306 

Disabled soldiers 123, 126 Franco-Prussian war 204 "Hindenburg Line" 51 

Division-army 103, 104 Franc-Tireurs 152 Hindu plots 18 

Division of Psychology 242 Frederick the Great 304 Hohenzollerns 215, 300 

Dobrudja 165, 166 Free Coinage 197 Holland 147 

Dora 152 Freedom of the Seas Belgium refugees in. 154 

Draft 5, 231 to 240 7,8,9,10,11,12, 13 trade 284 

Dreadnaughts 79, 80, 142 French 75s 101 Holy Synod 178 

Drunkenness , 278 French, General 306 Home Rule 169 

"Dud" 49 Frontiers 140 Honors conferred. frontispiece 152 

Duck -walk 101 "Frye" 254 Hoover, Herbert 278 

Dug-outs 102 Fuel Administration 245 Horses 152 

Duma 179, 180 Fuel ships 82 Hospitals 124 

Dr. Dumba 12 Galicians 162 Hostages 326 

Dyes ...207, 208, 209 Gallipoli 125, 129, 148 House of Lords 215 

Egypt 287 Gas masks 98 Howitzers 92 

Emden 132 Gas, poisonous 96 to 99 Huns 295 

Emigration 249 Gasoline 100, 286 "Hush-Hush" ships 141 

Emperor William II Geier 29 Hydroaeroplanes 26 

(see Kaiser) Gelrode 328 Hymn of Hate 225 

Enemy 289 General 107 Identification of fighting men 

Enemy Alien 3, 290, 294 George V 300, 302 114, 115 

Enfield rifle ,. . 87 Germany 3, 206 to 230 Imports 

Enfilade 96 airplanes 67 of Germany 206 

England allies of 4 of Japan 186 

(see Great Britain) army 95, 96, 97, 101, 115, of Russia 175 

Entrenching outfit 108 121, 125, 127, 149 Income tax 

Enver Pasha 318 conquered land 139 Great Britain ,. . . . 198 

Equipment (see outfit) costs of war 202, 205 United States 289 

Espionage 4, 322, 323 cotton needs 91 Income, IT. S 195 

Esthonia 159, 165 emigration 213 European Rulers 304 

Euphrates 268 exports 206 Indemnity 127 

Europe, Map of food 227 India 147 to 149, 171 to 174 

Plate II frontier 140 Indigo 208 

Plate XIV imports 206 Industrial conditions 

Executive order 27 industrial conditions 206 to 213 Germany 206-213 

Exemptions 234 iron 96 Infantryman 51, 108 

Explosives 88, 90, 96 loans 202 Inoculation 125 

Exports nationalities, map show- Insignia 109-113 

of Germany 206 ing, plate II. Insurance 239 

of Japan 186 navy 78, 141 International law 136 

of United States 279 political structure. .214 to 226 Interned German ships 25,257 

Eyeglasses 52 population 206,228,246 Internment 3 

Factories 321 prisoners 116 to 120 Inventions 

Falaba sinking 12 Prussia 212, 214, to 226 American 87 

Falklands 131 seaports 211 Irish 148,169 

Farm Loans 280 ships 25,256 Iron 96 

Farmers 238 socialists 218 to 221 Iron ration 227 

Farn 26 taxes 204 Italia Irredenta 32 

Ferdinand 1 301 Gifts to soldiers 50,52,239 Italy 136 

Finger-prints 114 Glacis 99 identification of men 115 

Finland 161, 166, 167 Goeben 133 war costs 201 

Fire-trench 49 Grain 138 "Jam Pot" 49 

Firing step 101 Great Britain 171 Japan 184 to 189 

Fiags of Allies airplanes 68 navy 79, 142, 188 

Plate XVIII army 114,121,124,147 population 248 

Flemish Belgium 154 casualties 124 Jellicoe, Sir John R 305 

Foch, General 310 debt 197 Jerusalem 130 

Food Administration 281 food 272 to 278 Jewish Welfare Board 299 

Food blockade king 300 Jews 168 

(see blockade) munitions 100, 320 Joffre, General Joseph 305 

Food conditions navy 78, 141 Jugo-Slavs 38 

227-230, 272 to 282 prisoners 120 Junker 216,308 

Food conditions. .229, 272 to 282 Greece 143, 150, 170, 301 Jutland 131 

Food requirements of army Greek Catholic Church 178 Kaiser ..214 to 224, 300, 302, 303 

51), 52 Grenades 49 Kerensky, Alexander 313 

Foreign Legion 149 Grey, Viscount 270,313 Kiau-Chau 187 

Forests 287 Gun-cotton 90 Kiel Canal 137, 267 

"Forlorn hope" service 45 Gun-layer 146 Killed 121, 122, 125,232 

Fortress confinement 225 Gunners King of England 300 

Fourteen articles 30 American naval 82 Kings 300,304 

France Guns 44, 73, 75, 85, 92, 94, Kipling 152 

army 101, 121, 147, 285 96, 101, 143, 242 Kitchener, Lord 305 

debt 197 Guynemer 68 Kite balloon 75 

food 276 Hague Conventions 157 Knights of Columbus 299 

Foreign Legion 149 Haig, Sir Douglas .., 306 Knot 83 

loans 200 Hanover 303 Korea 185 

Map showing lowlands of Hapsburg 301 Kornilov, General 307 

No. France, Plate V Harden, Maximilian 318 Kronprinz Wilhelm 29 

Map showing highlands of Heligoland 137 Krupp works 210, 307 

No. France, Plate VI. Helsingfors 166 Labor laws 319 

Population 247 Herrenhaus 215,216 Labor Unions 319 

president 312 Hertling, Count 311 Lachrymal shell 99 

370 



Index 



Landsturm ,... 241 

Language 294 

League of Nations 2, 35 

Lenine, Nikolai 177, 515 

Liberty Loans 195 

Liberty motor 72 

Lichnowsky, Prince 269 to 271 

Liebknecht, Kari 314 

Liege 157, 326 

Limitation of armaments... 21 

Liquid fire 99 

Listening posts 49 

Lithuania 159, 164 

Livonia 159 

Lloyd George, David 310, 317 

Loans 186, 191, 194, 19S-201, 

202, 205, 280 
Lorraine (see Alsace) 

Lufberry, Major 67 

Lusitania i 8, 9, 264 

Luxembourg 153, 158 

Macedonia 34, 171 

Machine-gun 44, 87, 94 

Mackensen, Gen 49 

Mahan, Captain 135 

Mail matter to soldiers. .50, 239 

Maltese 29 

Manchuria 184 

Manila 186 

Maps 

World at War Plate I 

Europe Plate II 

Subject Nationalities of 
German Alliance 

Plate III 
Belgium and Franco-Ger- 
man frontier 

Plate IV. 
Lowlands of Northern 
France and Belgium 

Plate V 
Highlands of Northern 

France Plate VI 

Alsace & Lorraine 

Plate VII 
Dalmatia and Austro- 
Italian Frontior 

Plate VIII 

Balkan States Plate IX 

Asia Minor Plate X 

Western Kussia and Po- 
land Plate XI 

Russia-European Plate XII 
Pan-German Plan 

Plate XIII 
Physical Map of Europe 

Plate XIV 
Bacial 2£ap of Europe 

Plate XV 
Distribution of Nation- 
alities Plate XVI 

U. S. Army... Plate XVII 
Flags of Allies 

Plate XVIII 

Marine Zones 85 

Marines, IT. S 43 

Marne 128 

Master list 231 

Maubeuge 308 

Meat 229, 272, 277, 280 

Medals of Honor 

frontispiece 

Medical Service 126, 242 

Merchant Ships 

American 261 

arming 26 

Japan's 186 

sinking 252 

Mercier, Cardinal 315, 330 

Mexican psace note 22, 23 

Military aims 136 to 140 

Military honors 152 

Milner, Lord 318 

Minerals 283 



Mines 63, 139, 284, 321 

Ministers and Ambassadors. 317 

Moltke, Gen 131, 308 

Monel Metal 114 

Monroe Doctrine 291 

Mons 149 

Montenegro 170 

Moss 

use for dressing wounds. . 125 

Motor cars 319 

Muller 132, 133 

Munitions 24, 100, 210, 320 

Mustard gas 97, 98 

Namur 128,329 

Napoleon 295 

National Army 231 

National Guard 103 

National Catholic War Coun- 
cil 299 

National power, comparison 

of 1 

Nationalities, distribution of 

Map Plate XVI 

Nationalities of German Al- 
liance, Map of.... Plate II 

Nations at War 1 

Naturalization, Australian.. 249 

Naval battles 131 to 135 

Naval screen 84 

Navy 

camouflage 89 

Chile 145 

France 141 

Germany 78, 141 

Great Britain, 78, 141, 145, 305 

Japan 79, 142 188 

neutral 141 

slang 86 

United States 78, 244, 293 

Neutrality 22, 24, 294 

Newspaper correspondents. . 151 

Nicholas II 183, 301 

Nickel 284 

Nietzsche, Frederick W. 316 

Nitrogen 283 

Nivelle, General Robt 307 

No Man's Land 49 

Non-combatants 151 

Non-commissioned officers .. 105 

Northcliffe, Lord 316 

Norway 147, 254 

Nurses 299 

Odessa 268 

Offensive army 50 

Officers 47, 105, 107, 241 

Oil ...83, 176, 212, 286 

Okuma, Count 312 

Orders 152 

Orlando, Vittorio 312 

Outfit 

cost of 52 

soldiers 107 

weight of 52 

Palestine 168 

Pan- Americanism 2, 294 

Pan-Germanism 2,218 

Map of Plate XIII 

Pan-Slavism 2, 33 

Paper 287 

Parcel Post packages to sol- 
diers , 50, 239 

Parliament 

British 223 

German 214,223 

Parseval 70 

Pay, army 52, 106, 148, 239 

Peace proposals 12,37, 41 

Peace terms 
suggested by Pros. Wilson 

1 to 41, 163, 290 
Peace treaty 

Eusso-German 175 

Peace without Victory 20 

Periscope 54, 65,102 

371 



Pershing, General 5, 310 

Petain, General 305 

Peter I 301 

Petrograd 163, 182 

Petroleum 286 

Phalanx 88 

Philippines 186 

Phosgene gas 97 

Photography 

aircraft 72 

Picardy Battle 296 

Pillboxes 44 

Platinum ,. . . 284 

Platoon 103 

Plim3oll mark 263 

Plots, Canada 18, 19 

German 18, 29 

Hindu 22 

Mexican 19, 20 

Ship 19, 29 

Poland 35, 159, 167 

Map Plate XI 

Polish Legion 149 

Political aims 136 to 140 

Political structure 

German 214 to 226 

Russia 176 

Polygamy 225 

Pope 27, 151, 316 

Population 246 

Germany 206, 228 

Japan 185 

Russia 247 

United States 206, 246 

Pork 275 

Port Arthur 185 

Portugal 150 

Postage 50, 52, 239 

Potash 283 

Powder 90 

Premier of France 311 

Presents to soldiers 50, 52, 239 

President of France 312 

President of United States 

29, 103, 163, 292 
Presidential proclamation 

3, 27, 80 

Prices, food 272, 281 

Prinz Eitel Friedrich 25 

Prison camps 11 

Prisoners of War. .116 to 120, 201 
Privates 

equipment 107 

pay 106 

promotion 106 

Pronunciation of War names 

357, 365 
Provisional Government ... 177 
Prussia.. 212, 214 to 226, 228, 303 

Punishments 104, 105,118 

Racial Map of Europe w 

Plate XV w 

Raider 146 

Raids 43, 70, 75 

Railroads 

175, 192, 209, 267, 271, 292, 321 

Rapid-fire gun 44, 95 

Rasputin 181 

Rations (see food) 

Raw materials 283 

Reconstruction work 293 

Record of Events in War. . 

341 to 351 

Red army 182 

Red Cross 297, 298,299 

Regiment 105 

Reichstag 

214, 218, 220, 221, 223, 313 

Religions 173, 246, 250 

Reparation 127 

Reprisals , 151 

Reserve troops 46 

Reventlow, Count 316 



Revenue Measures 

195, 197, 198, 289 

Revolutionists 177 

Rhine 210, 211, 266 

Ribot, Alexandre 311 

Rifle 44, 87, 96, 102 

Rivers 165, 166, 210, 211, 266, 268 

Robertson, General 307 

Roman Catholics 250 

Ross rifle 102 

Roumania 

139, 165, 166, 201, 212, 301 

Royalty 300 

Rubber 211 

Rulers 300 to 304 

Russia 31, 35, 163, 175 to 183 

army 115, 122, 128, 224 

Czar 301 

debts 181 

food 229 

identification 115 

map Plate XI 

peace treaty 175 

premier 313 

prisoners 116, 182 

population 247 

republics 1 63 

war costs 200, 201 

Rye 228 

Sabotage 319 

Sailors 

grunners 82 

identification 114 

ecarf s 85 

training 244 

trousers 85 

St. Mihiel 130 

St. Petersburg 182 

Salandra, Antonio 312 

Salvation Army 299 

Saltpeter 283 

"Sapper" 49 

Sarrail, General 308 

Scheldt River 266 

Scientific development. ..206, 209 

Scotland 248 

"Scrap of paper" 157 

Sea fights 131 

Seaplane 69 

Seaports 

German 211 

Sea Power 135 

Seas, free 31 

Secret Diplomacy 17, 30 

Sector 48 

Selective Draft 231 

Serbia 34, 149, 312 

casualties 122 

king 301 

prisoners 119 

war costs 201 

"Shell shock" 47 

Shells 55, 95, 97, 101 

Ships 

construction 244, 253,264 

destruction 252 

fuel 82 

interned 257 

merchant 22, 186, 261 

seizures 5, 256 

Shoes 52, 287 

Shrapnel 73, 102 

Siberia 182, 185, 192 

Sickness 231 

Sieges 130 

Silent Susie 102 

Sinn Fein 169 

Slackers 238 

Slang 86 

Slavs 33, 179 

Smoke-box 56 

Smuts, General 149, 308 

Socialists 219-221, 315, 316 



Index 



Soldiers 

allies 147 

duties 108 

equipment 107 

identification 114 

pay 52, 106, 148, 239 

rank 106 

Sound detectors 62 

South American Republics.. 250 

Sovereign 197 

Soviets 177, 181 

Spain 147, 247, 285 

Spee, Admiral 132 

Springfield rifle 87 

Spruce lumber 76 

Spurs 107 

Spy 4, 322, 323 

Squad 103 

Staff officer 107 

Star-lights 101 

Status quo ante 28 

Steel 209 

Strategy of the War 136 

Strikes 222 

Sturdie, Admiral 132 

Submarines 

54, 55, 57 to 66, 79, 146, 252 

Subsidies 264 

Suez Canal 267 

Sugar 213, 272, 273, 277, 281 

Surveyor-General of Army 

Purchases 292 

Sussex sinking 10, 11 

Sweden 262 

Switzerland 50 

Sword 107 

Tag identification 51, 114, 115 

Tanks 99 

Tannenberg 129 

Taxation 173, 198, 204, 289 

Tea 199 

Teeth 237 

Telegraph 267 

Telephone operators 51 

Territorials 147 

Tetanus 126 

Thomas 316 

Three-Emperor Year 304 

Thrift stamps 195 

Time fuses 92 

Tirpitz, Admiral 308 

Tisza, Count Stephen 313 

T.N.T 90 

Tolite 90 

Toluol 90 

Tolstoy 

prophecies of 182 

Tonnage 81 

Torpedo mine 64 

Torpedoes 8, 55, 60 

Trade arteries 266 

Trading with the Enemy Act 289 

Traitor 322, 323 

Transports 245 

capacity of 52 

defense of 5, 54 

loss of 56 

Treaties 

Russian peace 175 

Treaties, secret 16, 17 

Japan and Russia 188 

Treitschke 316 

Trenches 43, 48 

Trenches 42 

communicp + .ion .. . 102 

mortar 48 

outfit 108 

periscope 102 

Trctzky 314 

Turkey 35, 134-136 

army 307, 308 

navy 144 

prisoners 120 

Typhoid 

vaccination 125 



Ukraine 160, 163, 164, 167 

Uncle Sam 293 

Uniforms 150 

United States 
army 

5, 6, 42-56, 103-108, 231, 241 

Map Plate XVII 

casualties 121 

citizens in Germany 249 

cost of war 190 to 196 

entry into war 1, 3-36, 136 

food 279 to 282 

income 195 

Japanese agreement 187 

munitions 100 

navy 78, 293 

Vaccination 125 

Vatican 150 

Venizelos 317 

Visit and Search ....8, 9, 22, 23 

Viviani, Rene 311 

Vladivostok 185 

Volunteer War Work 

297, 298, 299 

Von Bernstorff 16, 317 

Von Bethmann-Hollweg, Dr. 

T 310 

Von Bissing, Geo., General.. 336 

Von Bulow, Prince 311 

Von Hertling, Count 311 

Von Mackensen 88, 149 

Von Moltke 131, 308 

Von Muller 132, 133, 225 

Von Papen, Captain 12, 19 

Von Tirpitz, Admiral 308 

Von Zwehl, General 308 

Voting in army 52 

Walloon, Belgium 154 

War Cost 1, 190-206 

War babies 248 

War debts 193, 194 

War Camp Community Serv- 
ice 29 

War certificates 19 

War Chancellor 3i' 

War loans 186, 191, 194, 

198, 200, 20.- 

War Lord 22 

War Savings Stamps 19 

Warships. 54, 78 to 86, 141 to 14* 

War Zone decrees 7-1 

Water 

for armies in France 41 

Waterloo 295 

Weapons of War 87-101 

Weather 293 

West Point 107 

Wheat 273, 276, 279, 281, 282 

Whiz-Bang 101 

William II ..214, 226, 300, 302 
Willy and Nicky correspond- 
ence 17 

Wilson, President 292 

peace principles 163 

Wire 

barbed 100 

Wireless 64, 86 

Women's work ...290, 319, 320 

Wood pulp 287 

Wood, Major-General Leon- 
ard 305 

Wool 210, 211, 288 

Workers 319 to 321 

World Map Plate I 

World War 1, 2 

Wounded 122, 126 

Yokohama 186 

Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation 298 

Young Women's Christian 

Association 298 

Zemstvos 179 

Zeppelin 69, 71 

Zouaves 148 

Zwehl, General 308 



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